PSYCHOANALYSIS 
AND BEHAVIOR 



BY 
ANDRE TRIDON 



"Since humanity came into being, man has 
enjoyed himself too little. That alone, my 
brethren, is our original sin." 

Nietzsche. 




NEW YORK ALFRED • A • KNOPF 1920 



COPYRIGHT, 1920, BY 
ALFRED A. KNOPF, Inc. 






-5 1820 



PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OP AMERICA 



©CI.A601381 



This book 

is respectfully dedicated to 

Dr. Edward J. Kempf 

of Washington, D. C. 



The author acknowledges his indebtedness to 
Dr. N. Philip Norman, Dr. Edward /. Kempf, Miss 
Helena De Kay, H. L. Mencken, Esq., Dr. Elizabeth 
Severn, Israel Spielberg, Esq., and Carl Dreher, 
Esq., who have either supplied him with material 
for the present book, or revised his manuscript or 
offered valuable editorial suggestions. 



PREFACE 

This is an attempt at interpreting human conduct 
from the psychoanalytical point of view. The un- 
conscious and involuntary play a tremendous part 
in human life, the more tremendous as they usually 
masquerade as conscious and voluntary. Courts 
and public opinion, disregarding that fact, either 
praise or condemn, either reward or punish. Psy- 
choanalysis passes no judgments and only seeks to 
understand and help. 

The author has not felt the necessity of restating 
historical and theoretical facts to which he devoted 
a previous book: "Psychoanalysis, its history, 
theory and practice." The various schools of an- 
alysis, however, having reached almost identical 
conclusions as to human behaviour, although they 
started from different premises, the last four chap- 
ters of the present book shall describe the paths 
followed by the four best known psychoanalysts, 
Freud, Jung, Adler and Kempf . 

Andre Tridon. 
121 Madison Avenue, 

New York City. September 1920. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 

Preface, 7 

I. THE ORGANISM 

i. The Unconscious, 13 
ii. Body and Mind, an Indivisible Unit, 23 
in. Nerves and Nervousness, 34 

II. PROBLEMS OF CHILDHOOD 
i. Childhood Fixations, 53 
ii. The Sexual Enlightenment of Chil- 
dren, 66 

III. PROGRESS AND REGRESSIONS 

i. The Negative and the Positive Life, 87 

ii. Speech and Memory Defects, 107 

in. Scapegoats, 115 

iv. Dual Personalities, 129 

v. How One Woman became Insane, 146 

vi. The Neurotic Aspects of War, 165 

IV. SLEEP AND DREAMS 

i. Sleep, Sleeplessness and Nightmares, 

185 
ii. Self-knowledge Through Dream Study, 

201 

V. PROBLEMS OF SEX 

i. The Love Life, 219 
ii. Can We Sublimate Our Cravings? 239 
hi. Puritanism, a Dignified Neurosis, 252 



Contents 



VI. THE PSYCHOANALYTIC TREATMENT 
i. Hypnotist and Analyst, 269 

VII. THE FOUR SCHOOLS OF PSYCHOANALYSIS 
i. Freud. The Pioneer, 289 
ii. Jung. The Zurich School, 305 
in. Adler. Individual Psychology, 319 
iv. Kempf. Dynamic Mechanism, 331 



VIII. INDEX, 351 



I. THE ORGANISM 



CHAPTER I: THE UNCONSCIOUS 

To the majority of people, our conscious life 
appears as the most important, if not the only im- 
portant, form of life. Most of our rules of 
behaviour, most of our judgments on human 
actions are based upon that estimate of our con- 
scious life. 

And yet we are conscious of very few things at 
a time and we are conscious of each one of those 
things only for variable, some times, very short 
periods. 

After a week, a day, an hour or a fraction of 
a second, the various things we were conscious of 
drop out of our consciousness, temporarily or per- 
manently. We may witness a theatrical perform- 
ance, be conscious of it that evening, think of it 
perhaps the next day, mention it several times in 
conversation, remember it years after when it is 
alluded to in our presence, and then "forget it." 

But the impression made on us by that per- 
formance does not die off. It only becomes un- 
conscious. That impression and millions of others 
are stored up in our "unconscious" where they con- 
tinue to live as unconscious elements. 

[13] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



These impressions meant either active or passive 
reactions to certain stimulations, the yielding to or 
resistance to those stimulations, memory-images of 
satisfied cravings and of repressed cravings, joy or 
pain, longing or hatred, in other words, all our life 
from the day of our birth, with all its struggles 
against reality, its compromises with reality, its 
victories and defeats, etc. 

All that past which we are constantly carrying 
with us and to which we are constantly adding, is 
bound, according to what elements predominate in 
it, to colour strongly our conscious view of life and 
to determine our conscious activities. 

A neurologist, a sexual pervert, a sculptor and a 
manicure would react very differently to the sight 
of a woman's hand. An egotist would be unable 
to notice in his environment things of a neutral 
type, that is, unlikely to affect his egotism favour- 
ably or unfavourably. To a farmer, a certain ac- 
cumulation of clouds might only suggest a danger 
to his crops; the same meteorological phenomenon 
might transport a painter with artistic joy. A 
chemist or a sailor would place a totally different 
construction on their observations of the same 
clouds. 

We know that unconscious factors cause us to 
engage in certain forms of activity, to become in- 
[14] 



What Made Me Do That? 



sane, to fall asleep or to remain sleepless, to love 
a certain type and to remain frigid to another. 
They influence our methods of reasoning, making 
us at times illogical and one-sided, stubborn and 
unjust. 

In other words our entire life is influenced, if 
not entirely determined, by unconscious factors. 

Our unconscious is the greatest time and energy 
saving machine, provided it functions normally. 
Some of our simplest conscious acts presuppose 
an enormous amount of unconscious work. Step- 
ping aside to dodge an automobile, simple as it 
appears, is only made possible by innumerable 
"mental" and "physical" operations such as realiz- 
ing the nature, size, direction and speed, of the 
dangerous object, selecting a safe spot at a certain 
distance from it, performing the necessary muscu- 
lar actions, etc., etc. 

On the other hand we may, without any apparent 
reason, perform useless, absurd, harmful actions 
and be genuinely grieved or puzzled over our 
behaviour. We ask ourselves "What made me 
do that?" 

Our unconscious made us do that. Our be- 
haviour was dominated and determined by one or 
several factors unknown to us and which, unless 
investigated systematically, may remain unknown, 

[15] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



puzzling, detrimental, if not dangerous, and may 
at some future time be once more the cause of 
irrational behaviour. 

Our unconscious "contains" two sorts of 
"thoughts" : those which rise easily to the surface 
of our consciousness and those which remain at the 
bottom and can only be made to rise with more or 
less difficulty. 

Our unconscious is like a pool into which dead 
leaves, dust, rain drops and a thousand other things 
are falling day after day, some of them floating on 
the surface for a while, some sinking to the bottom 
and, all of them, after a while, merging themselves 
with the water or the ooze. Let us suppose that 
two dead dogs, one of them weighted down with a 
stone, have been thrown into that pool. They will 
poison its waters, and people wishing to use those 
waters will have to rake the ooze and remove the 
rotting carrion. The dog whose body was not 
fastened to any heavy object will easily be brought 
to the surface and removed. The other will be 
more difficult to recover and if the stone is very 
heavy, may remain in the pool until ways and 
means are devised to dismember him or to cut the 
rope holding him down. 

Another simile might be offered. Out of fifty | 
persons assembled in a room, not one may be think- 
[16] 



The Unconscious Is Permanent 



ing of the multiplication table. Yet if some one 
points out three chairs worth six dollars a piece and 
asks the audience how much the three together are 
worth, the part of the multiplication table contain- 
ing the answer shall rise to the surface of every- 
body's consciousness, to sink back into the 
unconscious a second later. 

Other thoughts would not rise so willingly into 
consciousness: those associated with some painful 
or humiliating memory or with the repression of 
some human craving. Only a special effort aided 
by many association tests will in certain cases cut 
the rope that holds those "dead dogs tied to their 
paving stone." 

Such thoughts are called complexes and they 
are the most disturbing element in our life, for, 
unknown to us, they exert a strong influence on all 
our mental operations and on our bodily activities. 

It is not so much our consciousness as our un- 
conscious which IS our personality. Our conscious 
thoughts are fleeting and changing, our unconscious 
is more permanent. If we take a list of some 
hundred words and ask a person to tell us what 
comes at once to his mind when he hears each word 
spoken, it will be noticed that the answers which 
come without any hesitancy would be the same 
several months afterward. Those answers, in fact, 

[17] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



by their wording, present a striking picture of the 
personality, a picture which only changes when the 
personality undergoes distinct modifications. 

Only the words referring to the person's com- 
plexes are likely to change, as if the unconscious 
was trying to conceal the place where the "dead 
dogs" have been buried. In reaction tests, in fact, 
the subject's failure to give the same answer is 
taken to indicate a hidden complex. But even 
the varying answers given in such cases are closely 
related to one another. 

When we remember how our unconscious has 
"grown," that is, through the accumulation of 
memories and repressions from the day of our 
birth, or even from our prenatal existence to the 
present day, we must realize that a large proportion 
of the elements which constitute it is primitive, 
infantile or childlike, unadapted or only partly 
adapted. Its influence on our behaviour is not 
likely, therefore, to facilitate our adaptation to 
the innumerable rules imposed by a more and more 
complex civilization. 

Through all our life our unconscious follows 
us like the shadow of an archaic self, prompting us 
to seek a line of lesser resistance, or to give up 
the struggle with the modern world, to indulge 
ourselves in many ways which are no longer accept- 
[18] 



Wrong Suggestions 



able socially; when childlike or infantile elements 
predominate in it, its influence may unfit us com- 
pletely for life in modern communities unless we 
are brought to a clear realization of the ghostly 
power masquerading as ourselves and which tries 
to pull us back. 

When the man we were yesterday offers us sug- 
gestions as to conduct, we are probably safe in 
accepting them. When the boy we were at 15, en- 
deavours to convince us that his way was the only 
way, the struggle for mastery between ourselves 
and the boy may usher in a neurosis. When the 
infant we were at one or two years of age, coaxes 
us to indulge ourselves as he did and we yield to 
his entreaties, we may regress temporarily or per- 
manently to a level at which we shall be adjudged 
insane. 

Academic psychologists have suggested a num- 
ber of very interesting but meaningless words to 
designate the varying degrees of unconsciousness, 
such as foreconscious, preconscious, subconscious, 
etc. . . . 

For scientific purposes the word unconscious is 
sufficient. Instead of distinguishing degrees of un- 
consciousness which may easily change, it is pref- 
erable to assign reasons for unconsciousness. 
The multiplication table in the above illustration 

[19] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



was unconscious because it was not needed, for 
reasons of economy. It became conscious when 
needed. Other factors, mentioned previously, re- 
main unconscious because the thought of them is re- 
pressed or suppressed. Some are forgotten, be- 
cause they are insignificant, some because the 
memory of them is weighted with unpleasant con- 
notations as one of the dead dogs was weighted with 
a paving stone. 

It is the task of psychoanalysis to make us 
thoroughly familiar with the content of our uncon- 
scious that we may on every occasion determine 
whether the voices talking to us from the past 
buried in us are the voices of civilization or the 
voices of regression. 

Psychoanalysis forewarns us against any undue 
influence it may exert in the conduct of our lives 
and helps those of us who may have listened to the 
wrong voice to free themselves from their slavery. 

Instead of saying, as academic psychologists 
would put it, that the psychoanalytic technique can 
make unconscious factors foreconscious and 
finally conscious we should say that it can estab- 
lish a relation of cause-effect between certain acts 
and certain unconscious factors. 

For that reason psychoanalysis is the only key to 
an understanding of human behaviour. Ethics 
[20] 



Every Case Is Peculiar 



and statute books only record the various com- 
promises which mankind in its onward march has 
had to make with reality. They have, however, no 
absolutely scientific value, because they are based 
upon the conception of an inexistent being, the 
average human being. 

Psychoanalysis on the other hand discards the 
"average" man or woman and deals solely with the 
individual. 

The neurotic applying for treatment who states 
that his case is a "very peculiar one" is both right 
and wrong. His case as a clinical picture is prob- 
ably a very common one but as the content of one 
man's unconscious is necessarily very different 
from that of any other man's unconscious, no case 
can be prejudged from the observations made in 
any other case. Every case is "peculiar." 

The law and current ethics criticize or punish a 
pool for containing a dead dog which is held down 
by a powerful weight, and for poisoning those who 
drink of its water. 

Psychoanalysis looks for the corpse at the bot- 
tom of the pool and endeavours to remove it. 
Neither before nor after the operation does it pass 
judgments or pronounce sentences. 

To understand is to forgive, but in spite of its 
frankly determinist attitude in matters of behaviour, 

[21] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



psychoanalysis does not condone unethical or 
criminal behaviour. Hygienists would not insult 
or punish the infected pool but they would fence 
it off until the contaminating substances had been 
removed. Irrational and criminal individuals 
should be likewise restrained and isolated, not for 
purposes of castigation, but until such time when 
dangerous factors in their unconscious have been 
removed and when re-education has enabled them 
to resume their place among normal individuals. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

The subject of the unconscious is discussed very clearly 
in non-technical language by William Lay in "Man's Un- 
conscious Conflict" (Dodd, Mead and Co.) pages 48 
to 126. 

This book is an excellent primer for those who wish to 
familiarize themselves with the terminology of psycho- 
analysis. 

Advanced readers may study Jung's book "Psychology 
of the Unconscious" (Moffat Yard) which requires a 
certain knowledge of folklore, ancient religions and 
psychiatry. 

The chapters on Instincts, Memory Images and Trop- 
isms in Jacques Loeb's "Forced Movements, Tropisms 
and Animal Conduct" (Lippincott) will also prove very 
valuable from the mechanistic point of view. 



[22] 



CHAPTER II: BODY AND MIND, AN INDI- 
VISIBLE UNIT 

Academic psychologists simplify their tasks by 
allotting the body to physiologists and occupying 
themselves exclusively with the mind. Applied 
psychology of the analytical type has been com- 
pelled to discard that arbitrary division of the 
human organism into "mental" and "physical." 

Physiologists prying their way into obscure 
"physical" phenomena have innumerable times 
reached a sort of middle kingdom in which it seems 
impossible to produce anything "physical" without 
producing at the same time something "mental," 
in which, to every "physical" stimulation, there cor- 
responds a "mental" effect and to every "mental" 
stimulation corresponds a "physical" effect. 

After observing the constant interrelation exist- 
ing between secretions, attitudes and emotions, one 
no longer feels justified in speaking vaguely of the 
influence of the mind on the body or reciprocally. 
One can no longer understand life unless one 
admits that mind and body are one. 

The task of the psychoanalyst would be a hope- 

[23] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



less one if he ever attempted to study the so-called 
"mental" disturbances as purely "psychic" phe- 
nomena; the physician who would treat bodily ail- 
ments as purely "physical" manifestations would 
be baffled and impotent. 

It is only the profoundly ignorant who at the 
present day pretend to know the limits of the physi- 
cal and of the mental and attempt to attribute 
certain phenomena to the mind and others to the 
body. 

Cut off a frog's head, thereby removing the brain 
which is commonly supposed to be the seat of the 
mind, of the intelligence, of consciousness, etc. 
The frog then should be " entirely dead" or at least 
should not be expected to perform any act, except 
of a purely reflex type, showing any "intelligence." 
And yet if you apply a strong stimulus such as a 
drop of prussic acid to the skin of the frog's 
stomach, one of the legs will at once try to reach 
the burnt spot and to remove the harmful stimulus. 

Such a "reflex" act proves that, even in the 
absence of any thinking apparatus, the organism 
is aware that something harmful is happening to 
one of its parts and endeavours to perform appro- 
priate motions to protect itself against further 
destruction. 

If a set of nerves and muscles can "think" as 
[24] 



Nervous Hunger 



clearly as that, unassisted by any brain or mind, 
the so-called purely physical must be endowed with 
a remarkable proportion of "mentality." 

The deplorable inaccuracy of the words mental 
and physical is well illustrated by experiments 
made on dogs. 

Feed a dog every possible morsel that will induce 
him to overeat until the beast turns in disgust from 
the most appetizing food. 

Inject into that overfed dog blood from a dog 
who has been kept hungry for two days and the 
overfed dog will throw himself on food "as though' 9 
he were hungry. 

The same experiment could probably be per- 
formed as successfully on a man. The man, how- 
ever, would wonder at the possibility of his experi- 
encing hunger after being surfeited with all sorts 
of dainties. He would doubt the testimony of his 
"senses," and speak of "nervous hunger," of 
"imaginary hunger," vague terms which explain 
nothing. 

If a dog is infuriated by the presence of a cat, 
he will display for "reasons" which to him and 
the onlookers appear "plausible" and "logical," 
symptoms of anger such as the dilatation of his 
pupils, bristling of the hair, snarling, stiffening of 
the body, defensive poses. 

[25] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



Inject a small amount of adrenin into the veins 
of that dog or any other dog of not especially- 
vicious disposition, and in the absence of any cat or 
any other disturbing element, he will, "without any 
reason" stare, snarl, bristle up his hair, and gener- 
ally express, through threatening attitudes, violent 
anger. 

When large amounts of adrenin are released into 
the human blood stream owing to the abnormal 
functioning of certain glands, set in motion per- 
haps by some obscure unconscious thought, a man 
may likewise assume an attitude of anger, "without 
any reason," and may justify his attitude by "imag- 
ining" a grudge against some people, or impatience 
at certain things. His attitude may later on appear 
to him absurd and incomprehensible. He may 
then excuse himself on the plea that "he lost control 
of himself" or "he was not himself." 

A crowd may congregate and indulge in some 
ridiculous or violent deed of which, the following 
day, every individual member may feel deeply 
ashamed. "Crowd psychology," "mob suggestion" 
will then be invoked, the assumption being that all 
the individuals constituting the crowd had at one 
time a sort of "collective mind" dominated by one 
and the same obsessive "thought." 

A curious light is thrown upon the behaviour of 
[26] 



Mob Psychology 



mobs by the behaviour of copepods, small crusta- 
ceans, when carbonated water or beer or alcohol 
are poured into the aquarium in which they disport 
themselves. As long as their water remains pure, 
they are apparently in full possession of their 
"free will" and displace themselves as they please. 
As soon as the ingredients mentioned above are 
added to the water, they all abandon their occupa- 
tions and go to mass themselves at the end of the 
aquarium which is turned toward the light. 

If one continues to drop at intervals small quan- 
tities of carbonated or alcoholic liquids into the 
aquarium, the little mob remains in the same posi- 
tion. It cannot turn round. Nor can the helpless 
animals partake of their food, if that food happens 
to be placed at the opposite end of the aquarium, 
that is, away from the source of light. 

Drain the polluted water or place the copepods 
into fresh water and the mob will soon disperse, 
each small animal regaining its freedom of indi- 
vidual motion and of direction. 

Pour into the aquarium strychnin, caffein or 
atropin and the copepods will once more gather 
into a mob, this time, however, at the end of the 
aquarium furthest removed from the light. 

Their previous "fondness" for sunlight has been 
replaced by a "craving" for darkness. 

[27] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



Prophets, artists, reformers, lovers, may undergo 
all sorts of trials, brave starvation and death in 
order to seek their ideal, and some day they may 
forsake their ideal. Lovers having recovered from 
their "infatuation" may recall with astonishment or 
shame many absurd things they said or did once 
and look upon their former love object with disgust 
or even hatred. 

Certain animals like copepods can be fooled a 
number of times and be made to fall in love now 
with the sun, now with the darkness. Others which, 
were they human beings, would be said to learn 
very quickly from experience, are never victimized 
but once by their "idealistic cravings" and after- 
ward lead a perfectly "sensible" life. 

Take some newly hatched caterpillars and de- 
posit them at the foot of a rod or stick on which 
the sunlight is shining. They will all climb to the 
top and stay there, staring at the sun, apparently 
engrossed in the contemplation of their "ideal." 
In fact they would starve to death unless some one 
fed them a small piece of green leaf. 

As soon as they partake of that food, their 
obsessive sun worship seems to disappear. They 
climb down the barren stick and seek other stores 
of food, never bothering any more with the sun or 
other sources of light. 
[28] 



The Electric Dog 



Watch the behaviour of bees at mating time. 
Male and female can only fly in one direction, that 
is toward the sun, and their amorous ecstasy car- 
ries them into "higher regions," "uplifts" them, 
takes them "far from the earth." The sexual act 
performed, they both become once more crea- 
tures of the earth, fly back to their native hive 
and no longer feel the "fascination of the empy- 
rean." 

An invention described recently in publications 
devoted to electrical science shows how difficult it 
would be to draw an absolute line of demarkation 
between actions apparently due to physical and 
chemical causes and actions apparently due to the 
exercise of our "will power" and prompted by 
"feelings," etc. 

The electric dog has two eyes supplied with 
condensing lenses focussed on two selenium cells. 
Selenium is an element whose electrical properties 
change under the influence of light. The selenium 
cells control two electro-magnetic switches. Two 
motors, on the right and left, can propel the dog 
forward or backward. 

When light, as for instance from a small flash 
lamp, is thrown on both eyes, the current is switched 
on to both motors and the dog advances toward the 
light. When the lamp is held to the right, the right 

[29] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



motor only is actuated and the dog turns to the 
right. The dog follows the light in the most com- 
plicated manoeuvres. Shade the light and the dog 
stops; reverse the motors and the dog runs away 
from the light, dodging it wherever it may come 
from. 

Thus a moth will rush toward a flame, thus 
owls fly in distress from any bright light, thus 
human beings are perhaps "propelled" toward a 
goal, which they think they are striving for, thus 
the races of the earth once started on their westward 
wanderings, thus cities and towns, when not re- 
strained by natural obstacles of an insuperable 
nature, like mountains or bodies of water, spread 
to the westward. 

Naturalists manage to make the problem a little 
more complicated by telling us that animals and 
plants which are "fond" of light, that is which are 
involuntarily and unavoidably determined by light, 
are also "fond" of blue and green, while animals 
which are negatively heliotropic, that is "fond" of 
darkness and afraid of light, are "fond" of the 
colour red. 

And experiments on thousands of human beings 
have revealed that men are most deeply affected by 
blue, women by red. 

Whenever experiments first made on animals 
[30] 



Cats, Dogs and Men 



have been tried on human beings their results have 
been found to confirm the first observations. 

We know that the same method of training makes 
both a man and a passenger pidgeon sexual per- 
verts. Laboratory experiments have proved that 
female cats and female dogs react more slowly to 
anger stimuli than the males of both species, the 
result being a smaller percentage of sugar found in 
their urine. Observations made on college students 
of both sexes prove that the rule holds good when 
human beings are concerned. Human subjects, un- 
fortunately, cannot be used as frequently as they 
should be to assure us of the universal application 
of certain biological and biochemical laws. 

Some day when we abandon our wasteful method 
of dealing with criminals and give unredeemable 
offenders an opportunity to pay for the damage 
they have inflicted by submitting to scientific ex- 
periments likely at times to result in death, we may 
be able to ascertain accurately in what measure 
chemical determinism, for example, rules the lives 
of men. 

Specialization being the only road to thorough 
knowledge and efficiency, body and mind must at 
present, for the sake of convenience, be treated 
separately when in distress. Internist and analyst, 
however, must co-operate, both applying the latest 

[31] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



methods devised in their particular field and sub- 
mitting to each other the doubtful details of every 
case. 

While analysts agree that innumerable diseases 
of the so-called physical variety are induced or 
invited by some unconscious predisposing factor, 
no analyst denies the value of medical help or 
would suggest doing without it. If a subject has 
been so weakened by a wrong mental attitude that 
his body has become an easy prey for certain 
bacilli, all efforts should be made to check or 
eliminate those bacilli in order to avoid the further 
inroads they might make on the organism. 

Specific medical treatment should be sought 
under the direction of a physician who keeps him- 
self well informed as to the latest therapeutic 
methods, the most efficient pharmaceutic prepara- 
tions, etc. The family physician, the surgeon, the 
average specialist, however, cannot be expected to 
follow all the research work done in applied 
psychology. 

Although Freud and other prominent analysts 
have stated that psychoanalytical practitioners need 
not have medical training, an analyst should possess 
a good working knowledge of anatomy, physiology 
and neurology. Reciprocally, every physician 
should receive some elementary training in applied 
[32] 



A Basis for Co-operation 



psychology, regardless of whether he is to take up 
the practice of general medicine or to specialize 
in some particular branch of the medical profes- 
sion. 

Then, those who treat the more obviously mate- 
rial part of the organism and those who treat the 
more intangible part of the personality can co- 
operate intelligently in relieving the ailments of 
the human unit. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Two books are absolutely essential to readers desir- 
ing to study the problem of the interrelations of body and 
mind from the modern physiological point of view. 
Loeb's book mentioned in the bibliography for the pre- 
ceding chapter and W. B. Cannon's capital work "Bodily 
Changes in Pain, Hunger, Fear and Rage" (Appleton). 
The latter book contains a very readable and entertaining 
summary of many experiments made by Cannon and his 
students not only on laboratory animals but on them- 
selves as well, showing the chemical changes which 
correspond to the various "emotions." G. W. Crile's 
"Man an Adaptive Mechanism," while not as recent as 
Cannon's book, should also be consulted. 



[331 



CHAPTER III: NERVES AND NERVOUS- 

NESS 

Nerves, nervous and nervousness are terms which 
should be used less frequently and less carelessly, 
"My nerves are on edge" or "I am a nervous wreck' 
are picturesque expressions devoid of any meaning 
and which convey a very inaccurate picture of what 
is taking place in the organism. 

To the layman, nerves are just nerves; the nerve 
which a dentist "kills" and the nerve which makes 
our heart palpitate are to him identical things. 

In reality there are in the human body two 
nervous systems whose appearance, colour, make 
up, distribution and functions are as different as 
night is from day. 

There is the sensori-motor system, or the system 
of nerves which bring to the brain the information 
about the condition of the various parts of the body 
and about the way in which those parts are affected 
by the environment: the nerves which tell us what 
the eye "sees," what the mouth "tastes," what the 
nose "smells," whether the water in which we poke 
[34] 



The Autonomic Nerves 



our toe is cold or hot, whether the apple we hold 
is hard or soft. 

That system also transmits from the brain to the 
various muscles definite orders based upon the in- 
formation received. Motor nerves open or close 
our eyes, cause us to chew or spit out certain kinds 
of food, to extend our arm toward a desirable object 
or withdraw it from a dangerous object, etc. 

The sensori-motor nerves are white fibres en- 
veloped in a fatty sheath interrupted at intervals by 
nodes. 

Besides this system there is another nervous 
system for which various names are being used, 
such as the vegetative system, the sympathetic 
system or the autonomic system. These nerves 
are white fibres covered by a very thin mem- 
brane instead of a thick sheath and presenting 
a more regular appearance owing to the absence 
of nodes. 

Instead of issuing directly from the spinal 
column as the sensori-motor nerves do, the auto- 
nomic nerves, with the exception of the vagus which 
has its root in the brain, take their roots in a column 
of ganglia located in front of the vertebrae. 

Although this system disintegrates soon after 
death, for it is poorly protected and its ganglia lie 
close to tissues which putrefy readily (nasal mu- 

[35] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



cous membrane, buccal cavity and intestinal canal), 
it is older than the sensori-motor system and it 
is fully developed at birth. 

The autonomic system supplies the internal or- 
gans of the body, tear glands, sweat glands, salivary 
glands, hair roots, lungs, heart, stomach, liver, in- 
testine, adrenal glands, bladder, rectum and 
genitals. It carries motor impulses, but scientists 
are not agreed as to whether it carries sensations 
It also controls in part the movements of the pupil 

The autonomic system is divided up into two sub 
systems which we shall designate as the cranio 
sacral division or end division and the thoracico 
lumbar division, or sympathetic division or middle 
division. 

The two divisions are absolutely antagonistic in 
action. For instance the cranio-sacral contracts the 
pupil, the sympathetic dilates it; the cranio-sacral 
division slows down the heart action, the sympa- 
thetic division accelerates it. 

The cranio-sacral division promotes all the 
activities which build up the individual and assure 
the continuance of the race. 

The sympathetic division which extends from the 
neck to the upper sacral region, decreases or stops 
all those activities in emergencies and releases 
safety devices. 
[36] 



The Nervous Balance 



For instance the cranio-sacral division causes 
saliva to flow, which helps the disintegration of food 
in the mouth; it causes the stomach glands to secrete 
gastric juice and the stomach to contract regularly 
and vigorously, which activates the digestion and 
speeds the digested food on its way into the intes- 
tine; it contracts the intestine and hence assists the 
elimination of waste matter; it holds the rectum and 
bladder openings closed until the proper accumu- 
lation of feces or urine makes voiding necessary; 
it regulates the heart beats, prevents the pupil from 
admitting too much light and focuses it so that it 
throws a clear image on the retina; finally it fills 
the exterior genitals with blood and enables them 
to perform their specific functions. 

The sympathetic division, on the contrary, stops 
the flow of saliva and of gastric juice, stops the 
contractions of the stomach or reverses their direc- 
tion, so that food may be regurgitated into the 
aesophagus and, at times, vomited; it speeds the 
heart action; at times, it voids suddenly the bladder 
and bowels; releases into the blood stream a flow 
of adrenin which contracts the arteries and a flow of 
sugar from the liver which supplies the body with 
extra fuel; stops all genital functions; causes the 
pupil to dilate, thus giving the eye a staring glare ; 
bristles the hair, causing goose flesh, etc. 

[37] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



One can see at once how all the activities of the 
sympathetic protect the organism either directly, 
by initiating necessary activities, or indirectly, by 
inhibiting certain activities which are not necessary 
in emergencies. 

When the organism is in danger, that is, must 
resort to fight or flight, nutrition and sex activities 
should cease. Not only should they cease because 
the organism in danger cannot attend to them prop- 
erly, but also because they deflect toward their 
specific organs a certain amount of blood which is 
needed elsewhere for defensive purposes. Hence 
the dry mouth, the arrested gastric action, the im- 
potence induced by fear. 

As the blood must circulate freely in the en- 
dangered organism and absorb as much oxygen as 
possible, the heart beats are increased and so is the 
rate of respiration. As a larger amount of energy 
has to be expended, the glycogen (sugar) stored up 
in the liver must be released into the blood stream, 
after the fashion of a motorist who "steps on the 
gas" in order to climb a steep hill; if a wound be 
sustained, adrenin is mixed with the blood causing 
it to coagulate more quickly and close the wound; 
finally the hair must be raised, affording to certain 
animals, such as cats and dogs, a certain amount 
of protection against teeth and claws and surround- 
[38] 



The Vital Urges 



ing the body, in the case of porcupines and hedge- 
hogs, with an impassable barrier of sharp daggers. 

The sudden voiding of the bowels and bladder 
caused by fright is another emergency measure 
taken by the sympathetic division. Empty bowels 
and an empty bladder present a more favourable 
condition in the case of deep abdominal injuries, 
while the same organs, if full, might cause compli- 
cations. 

The activities of the sympathetic division corre- 
spond to what we may call the safety urge, while 
the cranial division which promotes nutrition and 
assimilation would correspond to the food-ego- 
power urge and the sacral division to the sex urge. 

We may notice that the nerves of ego and sex 
work in unison. 

The two divisions of the autonomic system are 
not always balanced with perfect accuracy and one 
of them is bound to predominate. This will enable 
us to distinguish roughly three "nervous" types. 

The type in which the positive activities which 
build up the individual and further the continuance 
of the race are not hampered by the negative activi- 
ties of the sympathetic except in emergencies. 

This is the type we may justly consider as nor- 
mal. 

The second type is one in which the positive 

[39] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



activities are so strong that they cannot be checked 
in emergencies by the safety nerves. When the 
personality is overwhelmed by the cranio-sacral 
division, that is by the ego and sex urges, the 
individual is unadaptive and unsocial. Criminal, 
gluttonous, obscene imbeciles belong to that type 
for which the terms vagotonic has been suggested. 

In the third type, or sympathicotonic type, the 
sympathetic division functions in and out of season, 
flashing danger signals when there is no danger and 
holding back the natural cravings for nutrition, 
self-expression, acquisition, power, reproduction, 
etc. Neurotics suffering from anxiety, obsessions, 
phobias, nervous indigestion, psychic impotence, 
etc., belong to this type. 

A very simple test has been devised to determine 
to what type a subject belongs. It is known as the 
Aschner test. It is based on the fact that the ends 
of both divisions, the cranial and the sympathetic 
divisions, can be reached and stimulated by pres- 
sure on the pupil. 

The cranial division increases the heart beats and 
the sympathetic division decreases them. By 
applying the same stimulation to both divisions, the 
one which is more powerful will react more easily 
than the other. If after pressing on the eyeballs 
for half a minute, the initial pulse, let us say 90, 
[40] 



Ghosts from the Past 



has been reduced to about 80, the patient is prob- 
ably normal. If the pulse rate has been decreased 
by more than 10 or 12 beats, the patient is vago- 
tonic, and if the pulse rate has remained unchanged 
or has been increased the patient is sympathicotonic. 

A study of the autonomic system enables us to 
visualize complexes as defensive actions of the sym- 
pathetic division or safety urge which were initiated 
at some past time, generally in infancy when stimuli 
are likely to produce the deepest impression and 
which continue to be performed when no actual 
danger has to be warded off, or in emergencies 
which are not real emergencies but appear as such 
owing to wrong associations. 

A child, frightened unwisely, may all his life 
show defence and fear reactions, which means that 
the nerves of his sympathetic division will con- 
stantly interfere with his digestion, his heart action, 
his intestinal peristalsis, his sex life. 

A child hurt by a doctor with a black beard, a 
classical case in psychoanalytic literature, uncon- 
sciously associated in later life all men with black 
beards with the man who hurt him once and when 
meeting such a man suffered from arterial tension 
connected with fright. 

Experiments made on dogs illustrate well the 
mechanism of association. 

[41] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



A dog was submitted to a delicate operation 
whereby the gastric juice secreted by his stomach 
would run into a graduated tube. For several days 
a bell was rung every time the dog was given food. 
To the sight of food there always corresponded a 
flow of gastric juice. One day the bell was rung 
but no food was offered to the animal. In spite 
of the absence of food, gastric juice began to trickle 
into the test tube. A "bell association" had been 
created in the dog's organism. In other words, as 
for several days the sound of a bell had been con- 
nected with the sight and taste of food, his auto- 
nomic nerves promoted the flow of gastric juice 
as soon as the bell rang. 

A study of the autonomic activities sheds a new 
light upon many actions which at the present day 
are considered as voluntary and subjected to criti- 
cism or praised from a purely ethical point of view 
based upon the distinction between body and mind. 

A sixty candle power bulb should not be criti- 
cized for carrying an amount of electrical power 
inferior to that which can flow through a hundred 
candle bulb. 

A coward is not a coward because he wishes to 
run away, but because his sympathetic nerves pro- 
moting flight are especially sensitive to fright 
stimuli which in other men would produce no re- 
[42] 



The Training of Nerves 



action or a reaction of fight. As Jacques Loeb 
would put it, a coward runs in the direction where 
his legs carry him. As the unscientific layman 
would express it, the coward "loses his nerve" or 
"is all nerves" or "cannot control his nerves." 

Punishing a coward and insulting him will not 
make him a brave man. It may compel him to 
pretend for a time that he is brave, after which he 
may succumb to shell-shock when his cravings for 
safety, long repressed, assert themselves violently 
and abnormally. 

But he need not remain a coward and can be 
trained to master his fear by analyzing it and by 
disintegrating the absurd associations which set his 
organism in flight when no dangerous emergency 
exists. 

A coward with a well developed intelligence can 
be made, through education, as indifferent to cer- 
tain fear stimuli as other people can be made in- 
different to some apparently alarming symptoms of 
sickness. 

For example : any one taking the typhoid vaccine 
will after the first injection feel dreadfully sick. 
He will develop violent fever, suffer from head- 
aches, thirst, palpitations, nausea, he will feel very 
weak, etc., in other words, he will, within twenty- 
four hours, experience most of the symptoms of the 

[43] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



disease against which the vaccine is to protect him. 
Duly warned by a physician, the patient will not 
worry over those disturbances which are "ex- 
pected," as suppuration is expected after vaccina- 
tion for smallpox. 

The patient knows what is causing his malaise 
and what its duration shall be. While he could 
not very well "enjoy" the situation, he resigns him- 
self to it as to something temporary and unavoid- 
able. 

On the other hand, should a careless physician 
fail to warn the patient of the effects of the first 
hypodermic dose, the patient would add to the 
unpleasant condition induced by the vaccine a deep 
worry, a fear of possible complications and perhaps 
devise unnecessary plans for emergency action, 
thereby affecting his heart beats, his gastric and 
intestinal activities and so on. 

Knowing to what type he belongs is as necessary 
for a human being as knowing, for instance, 
whether one of his legs is shorter than the other. 
A cripple in ignorance of the disparity of his legs, 
would gather the impression that the road he was 
travelling was strewn with ruts and obstructions. 
The longer leg would seemingly encounter number- 
less obstacles while the shorter would be constantly 
descending into holes. 
[44] 



Know Thyself 



The man with a vagotonic tendency whose ego 
and sex urges are apt to disregard the warnings 
of his safety urge and the man with a sympathico- 
tonic tendency whose sympthetic division is con- 
stantly raising the danger flag are bound to have 
very distorted impressions of their mental states 
and of their environment. 

Knowing themselves better, they can discount 
considerably such deceptive impressions and there- 
by correct their behaviour. 

Those called upon to judge them can also by 
understanding better their nervous mechanism, help 
them to conform to standard conduct. 

Even the perfectly normal man can derive much 
comfort from knowing positively that he is normal 
at times when, in a crisis or emergency, he might 
conceive doubts as to his condition. A knowledge 
of the functioning of one's autonomic system is at 
all times of great assistance in remaining normal. 

That knowledge also enables one to adopt or to 
avoid for scientific, that is, plausible and compel- 
ling reasons, certain forms of behaviour. 

The following observation made on dogs by 
Pavlof teaches a lesson which should be remem- 
bered by every human being. 

A dog submitted to the surgical operation I men- 
tioned previously secreted some seventy cubic centi- 

[45] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



metres of gastric juice when fed a certain amount 
of meat. One day, a cat was brought into the 
laboratory while he was partaking of his meal and 
aroused his anger. On that occasion, the amount 
of gastric juice which flowed into the test tube was 
just one tenth that accompanying a peaceful undis- 
turbed meal. Anger and fear had raised the 
danger signal in his organism and prepared the dog 
for fight or flight, but not for the enjoyment of a 
meal. 

A quarrel at the dinner table affects human 
beings as the sight of a cat affected our dog. Their 
flow of gastric juice is stopped or considerably re- 
duced and whatever food they take into their 
stomachs would linger in that organ much longer 
than it should normally. The result will be some 
form of "nervous indigestion," perhaps nausea and 
in extreme cases, vomiting. 

Observations of a similar order were made on a 
small boy suffering from a gastric fistula which 
allowed gastric juice to flow out of his body. When 
the boy chewed pleasant food, the flow was copious, 
whereas the chewing of some unpleasant or in- 
different substance was not followed by any se- 
cretion. 

The flow of gastric juice is not induced solely, 
as many people think, by the pleasant taste of food. 
[46] 



The Value of Pleasure 



The mere sight of appetizing aliments is sufficient 
to start the digestive fluids. 

Hence, a meal served in an attractive dining 
room, on clean linen, in dainty dishes, with flowers 
on the table, in a peaceful, soothing atmosphere, to 
the tune of caressing, unemotional music, is likely 
to be digested more easily than food served in 
slovenly, noisy surroundings. 

This applies to almost every experience in life. 

Pleasant memories of gratifying happenings 
create durable associations, like the food-bell asso- 
ciation which had such an appetizing effect on 
Pavlof's dog. Unpleasant memories produce per- 
haps even more lasting effects of the opposite char- 
acter and are responsible for a thousand "nervous" 
ills. 

Every psychological theory will have to be re- 
vised according to the rather recent findings of 
scientists touching the autonomic functions. While 
space does not allow us to dwell at length on that 
aspect of the subject, we may say a few words on 
the new interpretation of will-power which can be 
based upon the study of the autonomic nervous sys- 
tem. 

The vagotonic, whose "animal" activities can 
hardly be checked by a weaker sympathetic divi- 
sion, is called "a creature of instinct," "led by his 

[47] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



cravings," "subservient to his lower nature," "lack- 
ing in will-power," etc. 

H|e whose sympathetic system acts in all emer- 
gencies and in emergencies only, that is, does not 
create absurd, unconscious reasons for illogical be- 
haviour, is credited with a great amount of will- 
power. 

He whose sympathetic system acts in and out 
of season, overpowering his ego and sex urges, 
creating emergencies and raising obstacles, is con- 
stantly "nervous," vacillating, considering one 
course and then another, "unable to make up his 
mind." 

Education undertaken by a trained psychologist, 
not by a disciplinarian, may alter the first type by 
developing in his sympathetic division a fear of the 
absolute privation which may be the consequence 
of vagotonic indulgence. 

The third type also can be trained to recognize a 
true emergency from an imaginary one and to 
gauge accurately the size of the obstacles rising in 
his path. 

Neither type should be dealt with by jailers or 
judges. Neither should be held responsible for 
behaviour due to weakness or self-deception. Both 
should, if their conduct is socially intolerable, be 
restrained and educated. Those whose nervous 
[48] 



Ethical Considerations 



system appears inadaptable should remain the 
wards of the state and be considered as victims of 
organic maladjustment for which they are in no 
wise responsible. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

The subject of nerves cannot be well understood unless 
the reader makes himself familiar with the autonomic 
nervous system which in the majority of medical books 
is designated as the sympathetic system. 

The most important publication on the subject is H. 
Higier's "Vegetative Neurology" (Nervous and Mental 
Disease Pub. Co.) which is very technical. Consult also 
M. Laignel Lavastine's "The Internal Secretions and the 
Nervous System" (Nervous and Mental Disease Pub. Co.) 
and Cannon's previously mentioned work. 

G. V. N. Dearborn's "The Influence of Joy" (Little 
Brown) and L. E. Emerson's "Nervousness" (Little 
Brown), are two small books casting interesting side- 
lights on the subject. 



[49] 



II. PROBLEMS OF CHILDHOOD 



iBll 



^Sl 



CHAPTER I. CHILDHOOD FIXATIONS 

The seed of all mental disturbances is sown in 
our childhood years. Whether we hold with Freud 
that childhood memories, habits and repressions 
disturb our mental balance in later years, or assume 
with Adler that the neurotic adult simply draws upon 
his childhood memories for the woof of his fancies, 
the fact remains that one's childhood, directly or 
indirectly, determines the content and form of one's 
neurosis. 

The problems of childhood are therefore the 
problems of the adult. To a normal, happy child- 
hood corresponds a normal, happy adulthood. 
We cannot state that to an abnormal, unhappy 
childhood there always corresponds an abnormal 
unhappy adulthood, for most people manage to 
remain normal regardless of what they do or have 
to surfer at the hands of others; but we can state 
t 1, to every abnormality observed in an adult cor- 
r* ponds some abnormal situation which dominated 
the subject's childhood. 

The most fateful complication in a child's life 
i. d one whose consequences are recognized by 

[53] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



analysts of all schools without any exception, is what 
Freud has designated as the Oedipus complex, 
or the excessive attachment of a child for the parent 
of the opposite sex, resulting in a more or less vio- 
lent dislike of the parent of the same sex. 

Freud called it the Oedipus Complex as an illu- 
sion to the well known legend of Oedipus, King of 
Thebes, who killed his father Laius and married his 
mother Jocasta. 

Students of ancient religions and folk lore have 
noticed that the conflict between father and son, 
mother and daughter, constitutes the substance of 
thousands of mythological or popular legends. 
Psychiatrists have observed it re-appearing in many 
forms of mental derangement. 

Freud has stated that such an excessive attach- 
ment or "fixation" is unconsciously incestuous. 

The Swiss school of analysts would rather believe 
that the fixation is purely symbolical, the boy se- 
lecting his mother, the girl, her father, as an ideal 
of authority, intelligence, power, etc. 

Adler, of Vienna, on the other hand, believes 
that the incest situation is imagined by the neurotic 
as one of the components of his regression to a 
period of his life when he was absolutely dependent 
on one of the parents and did not have to face 
life and its struggles. 
[54] 



Imitation Versus Heredity 



None of those three views should exclude the 
others. There may be a slightly sensuous attach- 
ment in certain cases, encouraged by caresses of the 
mother for the son and of the father for the daugh- 
ter, in which there is a slight amount of veiled 
sexuality, each of the parents showing preference 
for the child of the opposite sex. But in many 
cases, Jung's and Adler's views appear very plaus- 
ible. 

To those three hypotheses we may add a fourth 
one: Imitation is probably the most potent factor 
in human and animal life. Like instinct, it prob- 
ably resolves itself into a set of little understood 
physical, chemical and nervous phenomena, some 
of which have been elucidated only recently. 

We are what we are because we have imitated 
some man or woman whose mannerisms, attitudes, 
mode of speech, and consequently, whose emotional 
life we have unconsciously reproduced. 

As in the first years of our life we have no one 
to imitate but our parents, our parents are likely 
to become our most obsessing model or ideal. 

This phenomenon presents many dangers. The 
normal child would be one who, up to the time of 
puberty, had imitated both parents without showing 
much partiality (admitting of course that the 
parents harmonized well enough not to create a con- 

[55] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



flict in the child's mind) ; who at puberty, would 
imitate the parent of the same sex, without exhibit- 
ing any hostility toward the parent of the opposite 
sex; and who finally would select secondary imita- 
tion objects outside of the family circle, thus build- 
ing up a consistent and original personality. 

The parental traits would be there, father and 
mother contributing varied qualities, and outsiders 
furnishing pleasing variations upon the parental 
type, introducing into the blend no discordant 
features. 

There are too many cases, however, in which that 
happy situation is disturbed. Sickness in child- 
hood may bring one child under the constant influ- 
ence of one parent to the almost complete exclusion 
of the other; and so may the death or continued 
absence of one of the parents. One of the parents 
may for rather regrettable reasons, attract and 
amuse the child; a neurotic, eccentric parent will 
have more influence upon his children than his 
normal mate (circus freaks attract children more 
than athletes), etc. 

Children coming home from the circus almost 
invariably imitate the freaks or the clowns, but 
even Freud would fail to drag a sexual explanation 
into that "fixation" which is often of long duration 
and incredibly powerful, considering the short time 
[56] 



The Family Romance 



in which the children were exposed to the influence 
of their favourites. 

Three hours at the circus may mean several 
weeks of attempts at performing certain stunts. A 
little boy of my acquaintance walked for several 
weeks like Charlie Chaplin after seeing him once. 

In many cases, the Oedipus situation resolves 
itself then into an exaggerated imitation of one 
parent by the child. 

A boy having selected his mother as the most 
perfect model, is bound to dislike his father who, 
not only is so unlike her, but wields too much influ- 
ence over her. 

If, on the contrary, he had selected his father as 
his exclusive model, he would dislike his mother, 
who is unlike the father and dominates him in cer- 
tain respects. 

The family romance of the neurotic girl would 
be similar to that of the neurotic boy. 

Imitation explains as much as sexuality and rids 
certain details of the romance of their apparently 
sexual aspect. 

The boy with a fixation on his mother, who con- 
stantly fondles her and has to be taken into her 
bed, is not attracted by any of his mother's physical 
qualities. He is, in all respects but one, a female 
who feels no embarrassment in close contact with 

[57] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



another female and does not expect her to feel any 
embarrassment either. The sexual fate of such 
boys, who later in life are very indifferent to 
women and not infrequently passive homosexuals, 
confirms the suspicion that it is rather imitation of 
the mother and self -identification with her than re- 
pressed incest cravings which dominate their be- 
haviour. 

The many male and female neurotics who are 
attracted solely to married men and women are 
subjects with strong fixations who seek, not pri- 
marily one physical or mental type for which they 
have a special affinity, but a situation, which in 
their childhood years was normal and habitual. 
The father they loved had a wife, the mother they 
loved had a husband. 

Their jealousy of their lover's wife or of their 
mistress's husband is what their dislike of the un- 
loved parent was, not sexual but egotistical. 

The boy with a mother fixation and the girl with 
a father fixation, will not only try to be like the 
favourite parent, but will on all occasions try to be 
as unlike the unloved parent as possible. (Clergy- 
men's sons.) 

One boy I have observed was the son of a pro- 
fessional man, very conservative, prudish and snob- 
bish to a degree. 
[58] 



A Restless Type 



His mother fixation had been nursed along by 
too much petting and fondling. At sixteen he still 
played in mother's bed mornings and evenings. At 
eighteen he showed absolutely no interest in girls 
and compared every girl he knew to his mother in 
a way most disadvantageous to the girl. 

After a severe crisis at the time of puberty when 
he once attempted suicide, his opposition to every 
one of his father's ideas and plans for his future 
began to manifest itself very clearly. 

The father was extremely conservative; the son 
embraced readily all radical beliefs. The father 
was conventional, the son unconventional in his 
behaviour and speech, and very slovenly in his way 
of dressing. The father was very settled in his 
habits, the son led the most irregular life, sleeping 
all day and loafing all night, having his meals at all 
times of the day or night. 

His revolt against the father-image, symbolical 
of authority, caused him to be involved in difficul- 
ties with various teachers and finally to leave 
college. 

In his sedulous avoidance of the father type he 
shunned all professional people and spent most of 
his time with menials and labourers. 

His distaste for work, which prevented him from 
holding a position for more than a few days at a 

[59] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



time, was in part an imitation of the comparative 
idleness of his middle class mother, financially de- 
pendent on his father, and in part an expression of 
dislike of his employers symbolizing the father's 
authority, and also a way of "getting even" with 
his father. 

His constant schemes for getting-rick-quick and 
his passion for gambling were attempted flights 
from reality and a search for the line of least ef- 
fort. 

The struggle between his normal and his abnor- 
mal tendencies revealed itself in his variable atti- 
tude to his mother whom he at times overwhelmed 
with caresses and at times treated very scornfully. 

Another neurotic with a decided fixation on his 
mother was unable to enjoy any food which had 
not been prepared by her or according to her 
recipes. Dishes which had never been served in 
his home during his childhood repelled him and 
when courtesy compelled him to eat of them, he 
generally developed nausea and vomiting. In this 
case, the mother fixation had not had any crippling 
effects as far as sexual cravings were concerned. 
He consorted with many women of different types 
but selected for his wife a woman of the mother 
type whom he constantly taunted by instituting un- 
pleasant comparisons between her and his mother. 
[60] 



Homosexual Fixations 



This man always voiced a frank hatred of his 
father and like the preceding type indulged con- 
stantly in dreams of get-rich-quick schemes which 
his restlessness never allowed to mature. 

Besides heterosexual fixations or fixations on the 
parent of the opposite sex, we must consider homo- 
sexual fixations or fixations on the parent of the 
same sex. 

They do not lead to conflicts as acute as those 
precipitated by the Oedipus situation. The boy 
with a father fixation is not impelled by his dislike 
of his mother to seek forms of behaviour which are 
eccentric or absurd, for, being a male, he will on 
all occasions act in ways different from hers. His 
dislike will be due to her dissimilarity to his ideal, 
which he will consider as an inferiority. 

Very different from the boy with a mother fixa- 
tion, the boy with a father fixation will not shun 
women but he will despise them and fear them. 
They will attract him as they attract the father he 
imitates but he will be more or less ashamed of 
yielding to their attraction. He will love them 
and torture them and the origin of many cases of 
cruel sadism is generally to be traced back to such 
a situation. 

Both forms of fixation have a crippling influence 
on a human being's life. Clinging too closely to 

[61] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



an ideal, he has a tendency to disparage all con- 
ditions which differ from the conditions under 
which he acquired a fixation. 

The man with a mother fixation will regret the 
days when he still was his mother's little boy; when 
life's emergencies threaten him with defeat he may 
regress to the childhood level on which he then 
lived. 

The man with a father fixation will follow the 
same deceptive line of least effort; there will be a 
difference, however. While the man with a mother 
fixation is likely to be a rebel, the man with a 
father fixation is generally a crusty conservative, 
a neophobiac, ranting over the good old days, old 
fashioned in every way, at times more conservative 
even than his father, for his father may have grown 
mentally while he lingers in the stage during which 
he acquired his fixation and still imitates his father 
as his father was when he himself was from five to 
fifteen years old. 

A conflict between the parents results often in a 
severe conflict in the child's organism. Parents 
living in disharmony lack fairness, measure and 
dignity. Their hostility to each other makes them 
repellent to the child who is constantly in doubt 
as to whom to imitate. In certain cases a fixation 
[62] 



Results of Family Strife 



on one of the parents may have disastrous effects. 

B. M.'s parents never agreed and finally separ- 
ated. B. M. realized her mother's mental infer- 
iority and drew farther and farther away from her 
in childhood. She was extremely attracted by her 
neurotic father whose lack of kindness and erratic 
ways, on the other hand, repelled her. Her psy- 
chology has ever since been complicated by the fol- 
lowing speculation: "I shall do this because my 
father would have done it but it is wrong for me 
to do it for my father was an unworthy type." The 
result has been acute hysterical suffering. 

I shall mention in the chapter on the Love Life 
the various perversions due to maladjustments of 
the fixation type in childhood. 

From a consideration of the mental growth of 
the child, one is forced to accept the conclusion 
that the presence of a male and a female in the 
household is absolutely necessary if the offspring 
is to be normal in later life. The child brought 
up by only one parent is likely to be one-sided or 
perverse. 

Affectionate parents are a source of great danger 
for their children and so are those who do not know 
how to restrain their children's affection when it 
gets out of bounds. 

[63] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 






Indifferent parents or the removal of the par- 
ents by death in the child's infancy cripple the 
child in another way. 

Egotism of the positive, progressive, creative 
type is the most valuable human trait, the trait 
which differentiates man from the animals. A cer- 
tain amount of self-love, self-confidence, self-re- 
liance is absolutely necessary in life. 

The child whom no parent has praised and who 
has been treated like an intruder, the orphan com- 
mitted to some institution where teachers or keepers, 
however kind they may be, cannot lavish on fifty 
or a hundred children the love which individual 
parents would lavish on each of them separately, 
suffer from a certain sense of inferiority which 
often leads to negativism. 

Such children do not know that they are impor- 
tant for they have never seemed important to any 
one. When herded in institutions they only have 
distant models for imitation, the few adults they 
could imitate being strangers separated from them 
by a wall of indifference. The result is often a 
stunting in mental and physical growth due to the 
wholesale imitation of children by children. 

The solution of the fixation problem will not be 
within our reach until the phenomenon of imitation 
has been studied more completely. At present a 
[64] 



An Unsolved Problem 



few scattered observations made by biologists con- 
stitute the only material at our disposal. Those 
few and unrelated facts, however, are enough to 
make us suspect the tremendous importance of 
imitation as a factor in human development. 



[65] 



CHAPTER II. THE SEXUAL ENLIGHTEN- 
MENT OF CHILDREN 

One of the statements made by Freud and which 
exposed him to the bitterest criticism on the part 
of hostile or ill-informed opponents, was that in 
children, even for the tenderest age, the sexual 
life attains a much greater degree of development 
than was generally conceded and that its growth 
is gradual and continuous from the day of birth. 
Puberty is the culmination of that progressive ripen- 
ing instead of being, as it is considered by many, the 
sudden, unprepared outburst of the sexual instinct. 

Sexual, urinary and fecal activities being con- 
trolled by the same nerves develop along parallel 
lines. All of them, however, are submitted to a 
severe regulation which in the case of sex amounts 
to almost complete repression. 

In probably many more cases than parents and 
nurses are willing to admit, there is a certain 
amount of sexual self-gratification indulged in by 
children between the ages of three and five, that 
is, long before puberty. Much of it certainly 
escapes observation. 
[66] 



ifi&Jlt 



<W 



Where Do Children Come From? 

Whatever of it is observed is usually considered 
by the average parent as a manifestation of some 
"vicious" tendency, and is repressed either by 
threats and punishment or by mechanical means 
such as binding the children's hands at night, etc. 

The general opinion at the present day in scien- 
tific circles is that infantile onanism is simply one 
of nature's primitive ways of developing the child's 
sexual powers, a process to be watched closely by 
the parents and stopped if indulged in excessively 
by immobilizing the child's hands, but under no 
circumstances to be repressed by threats or punish- 
ment. 

To that period of infantile onanism corresponds 
naturally one of intense and stubborn curiosity on 
the part of the child about matters pertaining to 
reproduction. That curiosity is generally brought 
to its climax by the arrival of a baby either in the 
family or in a house of the neighbourhood and the 
child will have no peace until he knows "where 
babies come from." 

What shall parents do when such a question is 
put to them? The problem is simpler and yet more 
complicated than it seems at first. 

The question is not: "Must children be told?" 
but "Who shall tell them and how?" 

If every grown up will be honest with himself 

[67] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



he will have to confess that as soon as he attended 
a kindergarten or school his sexual enlighten- 
ment^) was begun by the other children. 

Children cannot be kept in absolute ignorance 
about sexual matters because if the parents do not 
instruct them some one else will. Some one else 
always does. 

The choice is then as to between correct, seri- 
ous, sympathetic information, presenting sex as 
a tremendous fact of capital importance to the in- 
dividual and the race, a great source of happiness 
and misery and, on the other hand, whispered gos- 
sip of the most fantastic type, dealt out by children, 
by ignorant or vicious adults, casting upon sexual 
phenomena and activities an obscene, romantically 
attractive light, leading to overindulgence, per- 
versions, obsessions, etc. 

Sexual information imparted by the ignorant 
or the vicious does not satisfy the child, does not 
stop his inquiries, and only causes him to seek 
more details, to probe the fascinating fiction he has 
heard, to build up around it the most dangerous 
form of romance. 

Accurate information of a scientific type stops 
inquiries and day-dreams and vouchsafes to the 
child's mind the peace that comes with the securing 
of evidential facts, satisfactory to one's reason. 
T68] 



Neurotic Children 



Mental rest is necessary to the child. The 
child's mind is so burdened with the thousand prob- 
lems of adaptation and conduct, which confront a 
growing human being that the added pressure of 
sexual curiosity has been known in many cases to 
bring about neurotic symptoms. 

Three children have been studied at close range 
by some of the greatest analysts. One boy, little 
Hans, studied by Freud and in whom sexual curi- 
osity created an obsession which caused him to 
think of the male genitals in connection with almost 
every person or object he beheld; another boy, 
little Arpad, examined by Ferenczi and who, fail- 
ing to secure information from human beings, ad- 
dressed himself to the fowls in the henyard and 
identified himself with them; and finally, little 
Anna, treated by Jung, who in her search for a so- 
lution of the birth problem, propounded the most 
picturesque theories of life and death, lost all con- 
fidence in her mother and almost merged in a neu- 
rosis. 

The case of the 3^ year old Arpad, illus- 
trates well the mental distortions which, at the time 
when children begin to develop a strong sexual 
curiosity, fear may cause in them, if connected with 
the subject of their eager inquiries. 

Arpad and his parents went to spend a summer 

[69] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



in the country and stopped at a house which had a 
barn yard. Until then, Arpad's behaviour had 
been that of any normal, intelligent child of his 
age. He was interested in the various children's 
games and toys. 

That summer, however, a complete change came 
over him. His toys were forsaken and he did not 
seek the company of other children. From early 
morning till he was sent to bed, he would spend 
all his hours in the poultry house, watching the 
chickens with tireless attention, imitating their 
clucking and their motions and, when forcibly re- 
moved, grew generally very indignant. 

Even when led away from the fowl run, he did 
nothing but crow and cackle. He finally seemed 
to abandon words to use clucks, addressed people 
and answered their questions with sounds that imi- 
tated the cock's and hen's calls until his parents 
became quite concerned and feared he might loose 
his power of speech. 

Arpad's attitude never changed during the sum- 
mer. When his family took him back to town, 
he resumed human speech but could not be made 
to talk of anything but cocks, hens, chicks, some- 
times of ducks and geese. 

No toy appealed to him any more. He would 
all day long form little cocks and hens out of 
[70] 



A Little Chanticler 



crumpled newspaper and offer them for sale to 
imaginary buyers. He then armed himself with 
some small object, called it a knife, went to the 
kitchen sink and declared that he was cutting the 
throat of his paper chickens. He imagined the 
animal bleeding and by various contortions mim- 
icked strikingly its agony. Whenever the family 
purchased live chickens, he showed extreme ex- 
citement and his greatest joy was to attend the 
slaughtering of those fowl. He was however quite 
afraid of live cocks. 

The parents plied him with many questions and 
always elicited from him the same story: once while 
playing in the chicken coop he wanted to micturate 
and a rooster pecked him painfully. The child 
was then two and a half years old. 

Brought into Ferenczi's office, Arpad at once 
caught sight of a little bronze representing a moun- 
tain cock and asked for it. Given a pencil 
and paper he proceeded to draw a picture of a 
cock. 

Mental examination proved impossible and 
Ferenczi had to confine his study to the mother's 
observations. 

Early in the morning, Arpad would wake up the 
household with his lusty crowing. He sang con- 
tinually but all the songs had to do with chickens. 

[71] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



He drew all day long pictures of birds with large 
beaks. 

His parents yielded to necessity and bought him 
unbreakable toys representing chickens. They 
proved unsatisfactory as he could not cut off their 
necks. He would sometimes throw them into the 
oven, then take them out, clean them and caress 
them. 

Several times he attempted to break a vase which 
had cocks painted on it. He often expressed a 
desire to put out the eyes of live or slaughtered 
chickens he saw in the house, and gave vent to other 
sadistic and also masochistic tendencies. 

He identified himself and his family with barn- 
yard fowl saying that his father was the rooster, 
his mother the hen, he himself a chicken and he 
once told a woman of the neighbourhood that when 
he grew old and became a rooster, he would marry 
her, her sister, his three cousins and the cook, and 
perhaps his mother too. 

This remark was the key to the enigma of the 
child's conduct. Arpad had probably spied on 
his parents and the activities of the barnyard, the 
sexual activities of cocks and hens, the laying of 
eggs, the hatching of the little chicks had given 
him answers for all the riddles which his parents 
had refused to solve. 
[72] 



What the Fowl Knew 



With a certain logic he had that summer given 
up the language of human beings who were, so to 
speak, silent to his questioning, and he had adopted 
that of the barnyard beasts who answered all his 
questions and illustrated for him all the processes 
of reproduction. 

His cruelty toward chickens and his constant de- 
sire to cut off their necks was a natural reaction to 
his being pecked and to a fear of castration due to 
a foolish servant's threat. 

A repetition of the same threat caused him to pro- 
pound many questions as to the problem of death, 
angels and heaven. Later he began to occupy him- 
self with religious thoughts. Old bearded beggars 
impressed him deeply and at the same time at- 
tracted and frightened him. Often after watch- 
ing one of them he would let his head hang down 
and say: "Now I am a beggar chicken." 

The animals who had satisfied his curiosity had 
also supplied him with a model with which to 
identify himself. 

Very logically he had decided to cast in his lot 
with the knowing instead of the ignorant. His 
parents and other adults "did not know," the 
chickens "knew." 

The little girl observed by Jung, Anna, was a 
healthy, intelligent, lively child of three, who had 

[73] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



never been seriously sick and whose nerves seemed 
to be in excellent condition. 

She once asked her grandmother whether she 
would become young again. Her grandmother ex- 
plained to her that she would grow older and older 
and finally die and become an angel. 

And then, little Anna asked, "Will you again 
become a baby?" 

This was not the child's first attempt at solving 
the great problem of the origin of human life. 

Her father had explained to her that children were 
brought by the stork; then some one else imparted 
to her the supplementary information that the stork 
picked them up in heaven where they were living 
as angels. 

The remark made to her grandmother revealed 
the relatively enormous mental exertion, consider- 
ing the child's age, to which Anna had submitted 
herself. Children are angels brought down by 
the stork; grandmother after death will go to heaven 
and become an angel; then probably she will be 
picked up some time by the stork and become a 
baby. 

This solved more or less satisfactorily the prob- 
lems of birth and death. Death became a pic- 
turesque experience of a romantic type devoid of 
any horror and holding out hopes of rejuvenation. 
[74] 



Life and Death Theories 



Very soon after, her mother became pregnant. 
Anna apparently did not notice the fact or, if she 
did, failed to mention it. 

A few hours before the mother's delivery, Anna's 
father took the child on his knee and asked her: 
' 'What would you do if you should get a little 
brother tonight?" "I would kill it," Anna an- 
swered simply, without emotion, which in view of 
her theories of death and resurrection, implied 
merely that she would send the child back where it 
came from. 

On the other hand, she undoubtedly had de- 
veloped by that time her death-birth theory, for she 
asked her mother when admitted to her room, 
"What is going to happen now? Are you not go- 
ing to die?" * 

1 Bleuler cites the case of a little girl three and a half years 
old who, after the coming of a baby in the household, also con- 
structed a theory of life and death. 

She was extremely interested in the baby and its nursing. 
When bitten once by a mosquito she was heard to remark that a 
little breast was growing on her, and she resented greatly the 
disappearance of the swelling as the bite healed. 

One day her mother told her the story of the Ugly Duckling 
and she showed keen interest in it. She constantly asked to have 
the story repeated, especially that part of it in which the duck 
brings forth young ones. The wording of her request for the 
story reveals the problem which was on her mind: "Tell me 
about the lady and how the children come," although she knew 
that the tale dealt with a duck, not with a woman. 

Asked once why she liked the story so well she said: 

"Because it gives me so much pleasure." 



[75] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



Sent to spend a few weeks with her grandmother 
while her mother was recuperating, Anna constantly 
reverted to questions concerning the stork theory. 
When she returned she appeared annoyed and 
suspicious. While not hostile to the baby, she 
would keep away from it and sit for hours under 
a table, mournful and dreamy, at times singing to 
herself little songs she improvised and in which the 
nurse seemed to play an important part. 

At times, too, she would grow rebellious; she 
threatened to abandon her mother and to go to live 
with her grandmother. Once, finally, the result 
of her long cogitations revealed itself in an unex- 
pected outburst. 

"We are going into the garden," her mother said 
to her. 

' 'Don't tell lies, Mamma," Anna answered. 

"What are you thinking of? I always tell the 
truth," the mother said. 

"No, Mamma, you are not telling the truth." 

"You will see; come with me into the garden." 

"What gives you pleasure?" 

"The way in which the little children come out." 

Immediately after she added: 

"I dreamt that Suppenkaster (a character in a children's story) 
fell into the toilet." 

Suppenkaster in the story becomes thinner and thinner ..ad 
finally dies. After death he grows again. 

This child's theory was not essentially different from that b 
by little Anna. 

[76] 



Children and Flowers 



"And so it is really true? You were not lying?" 

This amazing conversation had only one mean- 
ing. Her observations had convinced her that the 
death-and-birth-stork-and-angel theory was an im- 
position and that, consequently, both her father and 
mother were liars. As the idea of relativity is very 
undeveloped in the young, if her mother lied in 
one case, she was bound to lie in every case and a 
simple statement like "We are going into the 
garden" was only another of her mother's fabrica- 
tions. 

About that time, the Messina earthquake caused 
the child to develop an intense scientific curiosity 
based mainly on fear. She spent hours in her 
father's library looking for pictures of volcanoes 
and lava flowing out of the earth. Her question- 
ing assumed a different aspect. She would ply her 
parents with questions like the following: 

"Why is Sophie (her little sister) younger than 
I? Where was Freddie (the baby) before? What 
was he doing in heaven? Why didn't he come 
down sooner?" 

Her parents, noticing her nervous eagerness, de- 
cided to tell her a part of the truth. Freddie, she 
was told, grew in the body of the mother as flowers 
fJ< velop out of a plant. 

This occasioned more questions: 

[77] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



"How did Freddie come out? Since he cannot 
walk, did he crawl out? And is there a hole 
in the breast or did he come out of the mouth? 
Why don't babies come out of the nurse or the 
servant?" 

One day, when her father was compelled by in- 
disposition to remain in bed, Anna approached 
him with the inquiry: 

"Have you a plant growing in you too?" 

Her dreams showed a constant preoccupation 
with the birth problem and were offering solutions 
for them; Noah's ark with animals falling out of 
it, spring and summer days with all the flowers 
coming out. 

A visit to a pregnant neighbour brought out a 
curious comparison between the woman's body and 
certain flowers and fruit. Then one day at the 
table, Anna took an orange announcing that she 
was going to swallow it, after which she would have 
a baby. 

We must point out the remarkable similarity be- 
tween the child's fancy and the various theories 
found in fairy tales and according to which preg- 
nancy is produced by the eating of certain foods. 

Thus Anna solved the problem of how children 
enter the mother's body. After which the role 
played by the father in the bringing forth of chil- 
[78] 



Horrifying Impressions 



dren began to occupy her thoughts. Certain re- 
marks she made seemed to imply that she had been 
spying on her parents. 

That manifestation of childlike curiosity often 
has disastrous consequences. The child who has 
watched the sexual act performed by his parents 
and cannot by any means understand its meaning 
may carry away the most horrifying impressions. 

Some children are terrified and obsessed by what 
seems to them a scene of violence. Some may de- 
velop frigidity or impotence later in life owing to 
the disgust they experienced. Some may be 
goaded into spying some more and waste much time 
and energy keeping themselves awake and waiting 
for a new opportunity. Some, identifying them- 
selves with the overpowering father, develop strong 
sadist, cruel traits, others, identifying themselves 
with the mother, will on the contrary, be masochistic 
perverts. Others will, owing to their ignorance of 
anatomy and physiology, develop curious obses- 
sive ideas of an analerotic type. 

Little Anna had, therefore, reached a very crit- 
ical stage at which definite action had become im- 
perative. 

Her father finally decided to satisfy her curi- 
osity. Confronted one day with a demand for ex- 
planations as to who planted in her mother the seed 

[79] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



from which her little brother grew, he gave her the 
following answer suggested by Jung: 

"The mother is like the soil of the garden, and 
the father like the gardener. The father plants in 
the mother the seed from which babies grow.' 9 

The explanation proved satisfactory and the lit- 
tle girl, after receiving confirmation of the truth 
which she suspected, that children come out the 
mother's genitals, ceased to cudgel her brain with 
the vexing problem which for two years had dis- 
turbed her so profoundly. 

Little Arpad's and Little Anna's cases point out 
a practical solution for the problem of sexual en- 
lightenment of children. 

Explanations based upon botanical phenomena 
do not satisfy the children, their little minds un- 
used to generalizations cannot draw from stories 
of pollen and seeds conclusions applicable to hu- 
man beings. Parents must either become the sexual 
educators of their children or allow some one else 
to play that part. A teacher or the family physi- 
cian and no one else, is qualified to undertake such 
a task. 

The parents themselves, however, properly in- 
structed by a competent person, would be the best 
persons to open their children's minds to such im- 
portant facts. By denying them such knowledge, 
[80] 



The Revolt Against the Parents 



they give to their children an impression of ignor- 
ance and expose themselves to the implied scorn 
which little Arpad revealed unconsciously by ad- 
dressing himself to fowls. By telling lying stories 
they lose the confidence of their children and cause 
them to question every statement they may make 
later in life on vital subjects. 

The revolt against the father's authority is cer- 
tainly due in many cases to the hostility and jeal- 
ousy which the boy feels against the man who 
monopolizes his mother's attentions, but in many 
cases too, the apparent stupidity and unreliability 
of the parents as a source of information on impor- 
tant matters, as exemplified by their dodging and 
fibbing about sex, is likely to exacerbate a boy's 
egotistical sense of superiority. 

If parents wish to lead their children they must 
obviously be ahead of them. If parents appear 
either ignorant of certain facts known to many of 
the child's associates, or too bashful to discuss 
things which his little school chums or some shady 
characters with whom he may be in contact, dis- 
cuss openly and without much embarrassment, the 
child can only draw one conclusion, that his parents 
are either lacking in knowledge or in courage, or 
hopelessly behind the times. 

Parents often wonder why their children in 

[81] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



school and out of school generally follow the 
wrong leader. If a child is nice, modest, well be- 
haved and soft spoken, he will get very little credit 
in school from his associates. He will not be taken 
as a model, and never will be a leader. The little 
Lord Fauntleroy has a miserable time of it in 
school and gets a lot of hazing. 

The foul-mouthed urchin, on the other hand, who 
swears and knows obscene words and seems to lead 
a romantically indecent life out of school excites 
everybody's curiosity and his advice is taken on 
every occasion. He is supposed to know things. 

Children are great egotists, whose main ambi- 
tion is to become grown ups and to be treated as 
such. They wish to be taken seriously and resent 
being considered as mentally inferior beings. 

The bad boy acts "like a man" and his "wis- 
dom" and "knowledge" make it easy for him to 
assume the leadership of "the gang." 

With a little more knowledge and less fear of 
certain words and facts, parents could retain their 
authority and save their children from many mis- 
takes committed while emulating the bad boys. 

The question of the sexual enlightenment of chil- 
dren goes much farther than the mere problem of 
telling children accurate facts about sex. It has 
[82] 



Parents and Children 



an important bearing upon all the relations between 
parents and children. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

The analysis of Little Hans by Freud is not accessible 
to English readers. The cases of Little Arpad and Little 
Anna, however, are infinitely richer in their psycho- 
logical applications and can be found in all their detail 
in S. Ferenczi's "Contributions to Psychoanalysis" 
(Badger) and Jung's lectures on "The Association 
Method," published by Clark University. The treat- 
ment accorded to children in the various epochs of his- 
tory is well described in G. H. Payne's "The Child in 
Human Progress" (Putnam's). 

The various problems of childhood are discussed 
thoroughly by H. V. H. Hellmuth, a woman physician, in 
"The Mental Life of the Child" (Nervous and Mental 
Disease Pub. Co.) and by William A. White, superin- 
tendent of St. Elizabeth Hospital for the Insane, Wash- 
ington, D. C, in "The Mental Hygiene of Childhood" 
(Little, Brown), two books which should be read by 
every parent and educator. See also "The Problem of 
the Nervous Child" by Elida Evans (Dodd, Mead). 



[83] 



III. PROGRESS AND REGRESSIONS 



CHAPTER I. THE NEGATIVE AND THE 
POSITIVE LIFE 

The positive human being aims at a goal which 
is ahead, in time and space, and perhaps at a 
higher level than the one on which he presently 
stands. He makes plans for a future of useful 
activity, of beneficial endeavour and of social co- 
operation. He expects to encounter problems and 
to solve them in his own way, perhaps in a novel 
way. 

The negative human being, on the contrary, 
seems fascinated by the past, seems to live in the 
past. He is constantly seeking some abnormal, 
unpleasant, painful form of regression, resorting 
to unsocial, selfish means, avoiding problems, and 
when he has to solve them himself, proving a slave 
to precedents. 

Since all men should obviously be positive, why 
do so many lead a negative life? Why do so many 
regress instead of advancing? Why do so many 
destroy instead of being constructive? 

Neurotics, perverts and criminals regress: neu- 

[87] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



rotics ransack their past life for ready made solu- 
tions which, in the majority of cases, cannot be 
made to fit modified conditions; perverts seek sex- 
ual gratification in ways which are childish and 
imperfect; criminals revert to ethics of the prim- 
eval days, when each man or each beast, ignorant 
as yet of any form of solidarity, assaulted every 
other man or beast. 

Regression is invariably due to some feeling of 
inferiority. Some people develop a weak heart. 
After which a rapid ascent up steep stairs, over- 
indulgence in dancing, or a hearty meal may be fol- 
lowed by discomfort which makes the owner of the 
inferior organ keenly conscious of his inferiority. 
Some of us have capricious stomachs or fatigued 
eyes, bad teeth, a bald skull, thin arms, fat legs, 
lungs which are too sensitive to changes in the 
temperature, etc. 

And most of us take those imperfections as 
granted. We do not worry over them, we reach 
some crompromise between life as we would lead 
it if we could and the life which our inferior 
organ allows us to lead; the man with a weak 
heart shuns dances and avoids excitement; the man 
with a poor digestion may select from the bill of 
fare a hundred dainties which demand no gastric 
strenuosity; the man with poor eyes picks out 
[88] 



Mysterious Organs 



books in large print; the thin person favours a fat- 
tening diet; the obese one selects a diet likely to 
bring him back to pleasant proportions; the bald 
man avoids exposing his skull to icy blasts; the 
person with decayed teeth uses a nut cracker. . . . 

All of them, as long as they are normal, find 
enough enjoyment in the long list of activities which 
do not aggravate their condition; all of them come 
to the conclusion that "it cannot be helped" and 
let it go at that. 

In certain cases the problem is more complicated. 
Baldness or bad teeth or palpitations are obvious 
facts and the discomfort they bring in their wake is 
easily traced to its true source. 

There are many organs, however, whose location 
in our body is very vague to most of us, whose 
names we do not even know, which are not painful 
when diseased or deranged, and yet whose faulty 
functioning may cause distressing symptoms. 
Overactive adrenals, causing by their secretion of 
adrenin, a constant sense of arterial tension, may 
cause us to experience obscure feelings of discom- 
fort which we express by saying: "I don't feel 
right, I feel out of sorts, etc." The normal man 
has himself examined carefully by a physician and 
follows the treatment prescribed, and unless the 
treatment seems to fail absolutely to relieve him, 

[89] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



goes about his business and does not pay too much 
attention to his condition. 

The neurotic, on the contrary, dramatizes his in- 
feriority, and instead of looking hopefully at all 
the opportunities which are open to him in spite 
of that inferiority, dwells constantly and stub- 
bornly upon the handicaps which it places on him, 
on the pleasures, advantages, privileges, which pal- 
pitations of the heart have removed from his reach, 
the attitudes his bald pate would spoil, etc. 

In the case of unlocalized, obscure feelings of 
discomfort, he may become despondent, expect 
death or a lingering illness, lose his desire for life, 
let himself drift. 

At times, a sense of inferiority is forced upon 
perfectly normal people by an environment which 
they have allowed to dominate them too completely. 

Healthy young men and women may develop 
a deep sense of sin when they find themselves con- 
stantly reproved for the "impulsive" acts, the un- 
restrained enthusiasm, the outbursts of demonstra- 
tive affection which are natural to strong, full- 
blooded human beings. 

In small communities, in puritanical circles, 
which are only too often dominated by oldish, sex- 
ually starved, narrow-minded old maids of both 
sexes, most manifestations of vitality are likely to 
[90] 



Repressing Normal Cravings 



be characterized as low, animal, bestial. Young 
women of an exuberant nature, who crave the 
perfectly legitimate excitement and the active life 
of an actress, of a concert artist, of an interpreta- 
tive dancer, are the particular butt for such at- 
tacks. 

Either they leave their environment in a rash 
way which not infrequently entails suffering or re- 
grettable entanglements, or they allow their en- 
vironment to indicate their conduct, they judge 
themselves as severely as their critics judge them, 
they co-operate with their critics in repressing 
normal cravings which soon proceed to seek an ab- 
normal outlet in the form of hysteria, headaches, 
torturing states of anxiety. 

Or they accept weakly their environment's esti- 
mate of their character with a discouraged "I am 
no good" as their justification and become a plague 
or a plaything for the world, drifting into promis- 
cuity, prostitution or "insanity." 

As neither normal nor abnormal people can 
carry happily through life a feeling of inferiority, 
they assume after a while a certain attitude which 
brings them consolation or compensation. 

The best and most fruitful attitude in such cases 
is the following: In one respect I am inferior but 
in other respects, I am or can be superior. 

[91] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



The positive man striking that attitude will strive 
for some form' of superiority: he may become an 
inventor of genius, a creator of new things, an artist, 
a writer. He may devise novel ways of curing his 
inferiority, of exercising the inferior organ (Adler 
has noticed that many people became chefs because 
they originally had a poor stomach and that many 
singers start singing as the best way of developing 
their inferior throat) . 

Accomplishment of some sort will restore the con- 
fidence which a feeling of inferiority may have 
weakened; it will compensate for the satisfactions 
which mere inferiority places beyond the inferior 
man's reach and offset the feeling that something 
is wrong somewhere in the organism. By accom- 
plishment, I mean the kind of positive, creative ac- 
tivity which receives a measure, however small, of 
recognition. 

Negative people and in certain cases, the origin- 
ally positive people who go to extremes, may be 
more tortured by their attempts at compensation 
than they were by the inferiority for which they 
are attempting to compensate. 

The world is acquainted with the many crazy in- 
ventors who are pestering their friends with some 
mechanical trifle they consider tremendous, with 
the cranks who would make the world an ideal place 
[92] 



Others Are Inferior 



by banishing cigarette smoking, the uninspired 
poets, the undramatic playwrights, and too often, 
the true men of genius whose fame is to be a post- 
humous one. 

Not a few merge into a deep melancholia on ac- 
count of their failure to impress the world with the 
importance of their fad, not a few are aroused to 
acts of maniacal violence by the indifference with 
which their "discoveries" are received. 

Another attitude which the inferior human being 
may adopt is expressed by the statement: Other 
people too are inferior. 

This may be a basis for a healthy and normal 
compromise with life. I should not take my in- 
feriority too tragically for many other people have 
a weak heart and yet enjoy life; many have im- 
perfect features and yet have found love, etc. A 
realization of mankind's imperfections is a good 
antidote for the romantic view adopted by many 
sentimental beings and which in too many cases 
leads them to idealize strangers, to make gods and 
goddesses of people to whom distance lends mftny 
graces. 

Such a realization may be very constructive in 
its results, for with it may go an intelligent sym- 
pathy for fellow sufferers, more tolerance, more 
patience, more kindness for other members of the 

[93] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



social body, who are burdened with the same or 
similar handicaps. 

That understanding is often a source of definite 
ego-satisfaction and the inferiority is often ac- 
cepted gratefully on account of the mental su- 
periority to which it leads. "Not until I was a 
sufferer from . . . did I understand, etc." is one 
statement frequently met with, and which is uttered 
with a certain amount of pardonable pride. 

The negative type, on the other hand, the neu- 
rotic individual convinced of his inferiority, will 
not have any peace until he proves to himself and 
to others that ALL human beings are inferior, not 
only in ways similar to his but in many other re- 
spects. 

His level will appear to him extremely low until 
he has dragged mankind down to the same level 
or even to a lower one. Without doing himself any 
appreciable good and without accomplishing any- 
thing positive, he destroys his environment's equi- 
librium and ultimately his own. 

He begins a campaign of disparagement which 
impugns every statement, every act, every motive, 
aims at dwarfing every accomplishment, attributes 
sordid or unethical reasons to every form of ac- 
tivity that comes within his ken. 

He casts reflections on other people's morals, 
[94] 



Withdrawing from Reality 



spreads vague rumours about their health, their 
disposition, their financial status. The gossip- 
monger enjoys a measure of power due to his repu- 
tation for having a sharp tongue; some, deceived 
by his spurious fearlessness, may respect him, some 
of his victims may fear him. 

But there grows around him a more or less con- 
cealed hostility which he soon capitalizes in order 
to lend plausibility to his scorn and hatred of the 
world. 

Scorn and hatred may soon lead him into intro- 
version, that is, withdrawal from human society, 
from social groups, which he characterizes as too 
superficial, from crowds, which he denounces as 
vulgar, from friendly intercourse, which he pre- 
sents as a waste of time. 

The foundation is laid for the introversion of 
dementia praecox in which the patient gradually 
withdraws into himself paying no more attention to 
his environment, interested only in his own thoughts, 
staring at unseen things and in some cases assum- 
ing the prenatal position of the fetus in the mother's 
womb. 

Another attitude which individuals may assume 
in order to compensate for a feeling of inferiority 
is the "sour grape" attitude. Within certain limits 
it is helpful. The man who fails to attain a certain 

[95] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



object may console himself by letting his mind 
dwell on the advantages instead of on the unfor- 
tunate side of his failure. "That position would 
have been advantageous but it would have meant 
less freedom, etc." The jilted suitor may remem- 
ber certain unpleasant traits of his sweetheart which 
might have made life with her a doubtful venture. 
The neurotic, on the other hand, proceeds to dispar- 
age all the goals which are beyond his reach. Un- 
prepossessing bachelors of both sexes are very loud 
in their denunciation of the badness of men and 
women respectively. Ugly persons destined to be 
wall flowers criticize the dances at which they are 
not welcome and the low neck gowns which would 
expose their lack of charms. Not only do they 
deny vociferously their desire for "sour grapes" 
but they condemn all attempts on the part of others 
at reaching the goals which have eluded them. 
Negative in their life, they become teachers of neg- 
ativism. They say "No" to life, because life said 
"No" to them and they avenge themselves by dis- 
couraging all those who, young and healthy, would 
say "Yes" to life. 

A craving for safety is natural in all living 
things and constitutes one of the essential conditions 
of individual or group survival. The race which 
is not afraid of other, more aggressive races, which 
[96] 



The Craving for Safety 



disregards the dangers accruing from epidemics 
and does not insure its future by permanent agen- 
cies of welfare, the individual who fails to stop, 
look and listen at crossings and never looks before 
he leaps, has an interesting but abbreviated career. 

It is especially when our organism is not abso- 
lutely perfect that we must exercise very special 
care to offset that handicap. The man with a weak 
foot should not take chances and cross avenues in 
front of swiftly moving vehicles. The man with 
weak eyes should not jump until he has estimated 
very accurately the distance between starting and 
landing points; the man with weak kidneys should 
avoid strong beverages, etc. 

Normal and inferior persons can indulge their 
craving for safety in perfectly positive ways, arriv- 
ing at a compromise between what they would like 
to do and what they can safely do without injury 
to life and limb, without loss of money or of social 
prestige, etc. The positive person asks: "How 
can I safely do a certain thing?" 

The abnormal neurotic person on the other hand 
will ask: "What shall I avoid in order to be safe?" 

In other words the positive person stresses the 
accomplishment, the negative lays emphasis on 
safety. 

Here again, instead of looking into the future, the 

[97] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



negative neurotic looks into the past for prece- 
dents, "How did I once find safety?" 

This means, as usual, a regression to a younger 
and younger stage, to one in which safety was as- 
sured by the parents, guardians or teachers, who 
solved all problems as soon as they arose, constantly 
created precedents for conduct and made all plan- 
ning for the future unnecessary. Thousands of 
neurotics thus run back to father or mother in a 
symbolic way. 

We are all acquainted with the man who uses as a 
criterion of his and other people's actions what "his 
poor father" would have thought of them, with the 
woman who does a certain thing because "it would 
have made mother happy," and also with the men 
and women who refrain from doing perfectly 
simple, legitimate, harmless things because their 
father or mother disapproved of them. Thousands 
are Democrats or Republicans because of their 
fathers' political affiliations and for no other con- 
scious reason. 

Such people are naturally hostile to every change, 
be it in fashions or in government, because, very 
naturally, there was nothing in their past which 
constitutes a precedent for harem skirts or munic- 
ipal ice houses, for cubism or original surgical 
methods. 
[98] 






Nagging Men and Women 



The feeling of strangeness experienced by many- 
neurotics is easily explained as a regression to the 
past. Life goes on, but they either linger at one 
level or sink to a lower one and reality is to them 
a more and more puzzling phenomenon. 

The old-fashioned type is often the product of a 
sense of inferiority, lack of adaptability and elastic- 
ity, low power of assimilation, coupled with an 
abnormal desire for safety. 

This attitude very often assumes a sexual com- 
plexion which may deceive superficial observers. 

The inferior male, who obscurely fears that he 
might not come up to the expectations of a sexual 
partner, disparages all women and seeks safety on 
the pedestal of his self -assumed masculine superior- 
ity. The inferior female pretends to scorn all 
males. The inferior husband surrounds his wife 
with varied protective devices which are ostensibly 
meant to protect her, and imply her inability to pro- 
tect herself. He dictates what she may read, whom 
she may properly meet, what she should wear, in 
reality, isolating her as completely as possible from 
other more attractive and perhaps miore virile 
males. 

The inferior wife nags her husband into giving 
up "habits," friends, clubs, membership in asso- 
ciations likely to supply him with alibis; in brief, 

[99] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



she protects him from women more attractive than 
she is by constantly asserting her ownership of him 
and excluding from his circle of acquaintances all 
sources of possible temptation. 

Inferior persons of both sexes only feel safe when 
the opposite sex has been humiliated. Men and 
women alike have contributed to the hostility be- 
tween sexes as a consequence of which the mascu- 
line domination which is now gradually yielding 
to the onslaughts of feminists, implanted itself for 
many centuries. 

And this leads us to a consideration of the will-to- 
power from its positive and negative sides. 

The will-to-power is a normal striving of the liv- 
ing being for the natural result of regular, un- 
hampered growth, physical and mental, of the per- 
fect functioning of all the bodily agencies of ac- 
quisition, assimilation, metabolism and elimination: 
power. 

Health and power are synonymous; power to re- 
sist death, power to do one's tasks without a feeling 
of exhaustion; power to join in all the world's ac- 
tivities; power for enjoyment; power to be used in 
emergencies. Every normal m,an or woman de- 
sires and seeks that form of power. 

The will-to-power, on the other hand, becomes 
negative when the craving for it is synonymous with 
[100] 



Negative Compensation 



a desire to destroy, not to create, to overpower 
others, not to be their equal in every respect. 

Instead of the positive statement: I must be 
strong, the neurotic says, unconsciously: "I must 
appear as though I were strong." 

Ferenczi cites the very striking case of a weak, 
neurotic clerk who, when submitted to some humil- 
iation by his employer, went out to seek some male 
prostitute. Instead of being strong, manly, and 
either meeting the insult with proud rebuff or mak- 
ing himself more valuable and more worthy of 
respect, the poor neurotic spent some money, rep- 
resenting power, in order to subdue to his will and 
to humiliate some wretched man of the gutter. 

And indeed, that psychology is not as rare as one 
might think; to many a neurotic, physical relations 
are symbolical of a humiliation of the woman; 
many a jealous neurotic has confessed to me that 
his worse torture was not the suspicion that his 
wife's affection was growing less but that some 
other man might subject her to his will even as he 
himself did. 

Innumerable neurotic disturbances, epilepsy, 
sick headaches, dizziness, fainting spells, are ex- 
pedients enabling the sick to indulge their will-to- 
power in a negative way. Instead of accumulat- 
ing strength, they wear out the strength of those 

[101] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



with whom they come in contact and who have to 
take care of them. Many an epileptic, facing de- 
feat, "throws" a fit and thus gains an advantage he 
could not claim justly. 

The woman with a sick headache silences the 
entire household; the dizzy person suffering from 
agoraphobia, requires an escort; the person who 
faints commands the services and the attention of 
all those present. None of those neurotic sufferers 
is conscious of that procedure but almost all of 
them confess naively some time or other to the 
pleasure vouchsafed them by the prompt succour 
offered them. 

And in that naive avowal there is concealed one 
more egotistical satisfaction: "You see how ap- 
preciative I am. . . ." This is one form of uncon- 
scious hypocrisy very noticeable in people with a 
weak heart. They promptly exploit the popular 
superstition which makes the heart the centre of all 
the tender emotions and boast of their sensitiveness 
which naturally makes them more sympathetic and 
places a new duty upon those whom they uncon- 
sciously victimize. 

Self-knowledge as acquired through analysis or 
self -analysis, is the only protection against a nega- 
tive orientation, against an attitude which is dis- 
astrous to the sufferer and his environment. For 
[102] 



Neurotic Superiority 



while the neurotic derives infinite unconscious sat- 
isfaction from his abnormality he consciously goes 
through the tortures of hell. His spurious su- 
periority and power do not satisfy him consciously. 
And this is one of the reasons why he is so easily 
aroused, so vituperative and insulting in disputes. 
From this he again derives a certain superiority. 
People are afraid of discussing any subject with a 
neurotic and oftentimes yield point after point in 
order to avoid unpleasantness. 

The neurotic obscurely feels that his arguments 
are not valid, that his position is untenable, that 
his evidence could not stand any test and his anger 
at his own powerlessness is projected on those who 
cross-examine him. He is like a man who has 
been hypnotized and unconsciously invents very 
plausible reasons for proving that he did of his 
free will what the hypnotist commanded him to do. 

Insight into our unconscious, like the gradual 
and detailed explanations of the hypnotist to his 
subject, allows both neurotic and medium to realize 
that they were subjected for a while to an abnormal 
influence and that to a certain extent "they were not 
themselves." 

The problem to solve constantly in human con- 
duct is: "Am I myself, is it I myself who am 
speaking and acting or is it my unconscious self, 

[103] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



attempting to follow the line of least resistance, 
leading me toward regression instead of progress, 
toward the past instead of toward the future?" 

Conduct based upon that system alone might 
not be perfectly normal. Introversion and extro- 
version, that is the fixation of our attention upon 
ourselves or upon exterior objects, can both be 
normal and abnormal. Extreme introversion, the 
detachment of our interest from the entire world 
and its fixation on ourselves alone means absolute 
negativism;; extreme extroversion, the constant chas- 
ing of a new butterfly, exaggerated interest in every 
passing fad or detail of life, means the squandering 
of our resources, mental and physical, on a hundred 
goals none of which is ever reached. 

He who attempts too many things is almost as 
unproductive as he who withdraws from reality. 

Our reactions to stimulus words and our dreams 
alone can give us a clear picture of our orientation. 
Introversion and extroversion are easily determined 
by even a superficial examination of the first and our 
dreams reveal to us accurately what our uncon- 
scious is trying to make us do. 

The Aschner test described on page 40 is a sim- 
ple way of confirming the diagnosis. 

He whose reactions reveal him as extremely self- 
[104] 



Positive Standards 



centred and introverted should be on his guard 
against that tendency and force himself to adopt 
attitudes which will lead to fewer conflicts with his 
environment. 

The overmodest person burdened with a feeling 
of inferiority can go through a systematic training 
of ego-building and personality development. 

In other words, those who have been deceived 
by their unconscious and who know to what extent 
the deception has gone, may discount their first im- 
pressions and withhold final judgment until they 
have ascertained whether their conscious I or their 
unconscious I is responsible for that first impres- 
sion and is dictating their judgment. 

We must now and then go through the process 
which the Catholics call examination of conscience 
and submit our attitudes to a test based upon the 
following five propositions: 

A tendency to constantly disparage is negative 
and should put ourselves on our guard. 

Desire for power that exalts us at the expense of 
others is also negative. 

The constant search for precedents is negative. 

In brief, whatever enables us to harmonize with 
our environment and to help it toward its goal is 
positive. 

[105] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



Whatever creates disharmony between ourselves 
and our environment and retards its onward march 
is negative. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

For a study of the neurotic temperament consult 
William A. White's "Elements of Character Formation" 
and "Principles of Mental Hygiene," both published by 
Macmillan. "Human Motives," by J. J. Putnam, is a 
very simple presentation of the hidden forces which com- 
pel us to act abnormally at times. 

The deepest and most searching analysis of the neu- 
rotic's mental workings will be found in A. Adler's "The 
Neurotic Constitution" (Moffat, Yard) which requires 
very careful reading, for it presupposes a certain knowl- 
edge of analytic methods and has been translated in 
rather heavy style. 



[106] 



CHAPTER II. SPEECH AND MEMORY DE- 
FECTS 

The neurotic type in its negative attitude to life 
refuses to face unpleasant facts. It adopts the os- 
trich's tactics and buries its head in the sand. The 
most efficient way to flee from an unpleasant reality 
is not to know any longer that it was once perceived. 
Oblivion is the simplest way to rid oneself of an 
unpleasant fact. If it cannot be entirely forgotten, 
avoiding to mention it is the next best negative ex- 
pedient. Loss of memory, partial or complete, ob- 
literates a part of our biography which we lack 
courage to acknowledge as our own. Aphasia, 
aphonia or stammering withhold conveniently state- 
ments which our unconscious considers damaging. 

A German woman of fifty who at the beginning 
of the war had been especially loud in her proger- 
manism and had thereby caused her family and 
relatives a great deal of annoyance, was absolutely 
prostrated when her son, a naturalized citizen, was 
drafted. A panicky fear seized her lest her indis- 
crete utterances might bring punishment upon her 
beloved boy's head. 

[107] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



The night when he left for camp, she became 
strangely silent and the next morning she was ab- 
solutely disoriented, being unable to recognize any 
member of her family or her environment. 

Her memory for everything which had occurred 
since August, 1914, was entirely gone; she could 
speak only with great difficulty and for a while 
her vocal cords lost all resonance; she regained to a 
certain extent her powers of speech when express- 
ing herself in English but she was absolutely unable 
to make herself heard when she talked German. 

On the other hand, her memory of events preced- 
ing the world catastrophe was absolutely unim- 
paired. While she never joined a conversation or 
addressed any one first she would very often supply 
with astounding accuracy facts or dates needed by 
those conversing in her presence. All the facts 
of her biography and of that of her children ante- 
dating 1914 were perfectly clear and well remem- 
bered, but when asked their age, she gave the age 
they had reached in August, 1914. 

Here is a case then in which partial amnesia and 
partial aphasia proved a negative asset to the neu- 
rotic. The war which brought her much misfor- 
tune was forgotten. The voice which had carried 
to hostile ears many indiscrete statements was 
muted and the language which at a time none could 
[108] 



The Ways of the Stammerer 



speak in public without being eyed suspiciously or 
ostracised, failed to make her vocal cords vibrate. 

A stammerer engaged in scientific research never 
had any difficulty in mentioning a certain chemical 
whose methods of production he was trying hard 
to improve. One day, however, a fellow laboratory 
worker forestalled him in finding a more efficient 
device. At the next appointment, the stammerer 
was almost unable to tell me of the occurrence and 
could not for several minutes pronounce clearly the 
name of the chemical in question. His unconscious 
egotism was bent on withholding from me informa- 
tion of a humiliating character. As soon as the 
neurotic expedient became obvious to him, his im- 
pediment disappeared. 

A woman compelled in self-defence to tell her 
husband a very complicated story lacking in plaus- 
ibility, began to stammer whenever a word in her 
conversation seemed to be unconsciously associated 
with the compromising incident. A full confession 
in my office relieved the tension and the "watchful 
technique" did the rest. 

A study of all cases of memory and speech dis- 
turbances will soon convince the observer that our 
memory does not retain or lose words and facts 
indiscriminately. 

Stammerers do not stammer indiscriminately. 

[109] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



There always is an absurd unconscious reason, 
neurotically logical, which causes us to forget a 
word, a fact, a duty, a figure, or to lose partly or 
completely our powers of speech. 

We may forget anything which has an unpleasant 
unconscious connotation, we may stammer on any 
word which has an unpleasant association or be 
totally unable to pronounce it. 

Hence the usual methods for improving the mem- 
ory are psychologically absurd. 

We may memorize long lists of words or sen- 
tences, poems and orations and yet at the crucial 
moment the right word may be withheld because 
some unconscious complex makes it impossible for 
us to utter it. 

Mnemotechnic methods which seek to create new 
and at times illogical and absurd associations of the 
"clang" type or of the pun type are better. They 
grant unconsciously what the analysts claim, that 
the associations conjured up by a word may be of 
such a nature that the word cannot be uttered and 
they seek to replace a natural and unconscious as- 
sociation by an unnatural and conscious one. 

This involves however a gigantic amount of ex- 
ertion and the results of this procedure cannot be 
permanent. 

The removal of the complexes which hold words 
[110] 



Why We Forget 



down is the only scientific method for "improving" 
one's memory. Psychoanalysis does not, however, 
"improve" one's memory; it disintegrates the ele- 
ments which impair our memory. 

Our memory is simply the faculty our autonomic 
nerves have of making use, in an emergency, of im- 
pressions received in the course of our bringing up. 
When some fear-impression causes the safety divi- 
sion of the autonomic system to repress the natural 
activities of the other divisions, the words are, if the 
repression is complete, entirely forgotten, or if the 
repression is less complete, remembered but unpro- 
nounceable and, if the repression fails, stammered 
on more or less painfully. 

The various cures suggested for stammering 
have never cured any one permanently. 

Any stammerer can be trained to read without 
any difficulty lists of disconnected words and sen- 
tences of varying length. Any stammerer can be 
trained to sing without stammering. 

This means that the words he studies lose grad- 
ually their present, unconscious associations and 
become mere sounds. As soon, however, as those 
words are grouped differently and acquire anew 
their unconscious associations, the stammerer once 
more becomes tongue-tied. 

Making the sufferer change the pitch of his voice, 

[in] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



one popular method of treating stammerers, is just 
as inefficient. Called upon to single out one word 
and to treat it as a "vehicle" for sound, not for 
thought, the stammerer no longer feels any embar- 
rassment. The embarrassment returns, however, 
when the stammerer has to speak in a natural, even 
tone of voice. 

Experiments show that fixation of the reading 
glance on one word only at a time, helps the stam- 
merer, for it accomplishes more simply the same 
purpose as a change of pitch. It disconnects each 
word from its context and hence rids it of its as- 
sociations. 

This is, however, little more than an expedient 
and does not go to the root of the matter. 

Nothing avails except to free the subject from the 
unconscious complexes withholding the words on 
which he stammers. 

The stammerer who gains insight into the mech- 
anism of his disability, who realizes not only that 
every bothersome word, sound or even letter, is 
fraught with an unpleasant connotation, but, fur- 
thermore, that his stammering is a valuable nega- 
tive asset for him, will gradually acquire perfect 
fluency of speech. 

One stammerer I treated came to realize that his 
stammering enabled him to dominate his environ- 
[112] 



Memory and Speech Training 



merit, as his mother and sister had to do all his 
shopping, receive and send all his telephone mes- 
sages; he could keep his employer waiting for ex- 
planations, he could delay his answers and modify 
their wording (hereby satisfying his safety crav- 
ings). While he could pronounce without diffi- 
culty the name of any woman he was acquainted 
with, he could seldom pronounce men's names, es- 
pecially when those men wielded some authority 
over him. 

The usual memory and speech methods are based 
on the assumption that certain people are born 
with a poor memory or a "heavy tongue." Psycho- 
analysis assumes that all human beings are born 
with probably the same average ability but that 
in the course of their bringing up some of that 
average ability has been handicapped by complexes 
and cannot manifest itself freely. Instead of de- 
veloping memory or fluency, psychoanalysis busies 
itself with the removal of the complexes which 
disable the patient. 

This precludes the relapses which are so frequent 
and so discouraging in the treatment of amnesia, 
aphasia and stammering by the old fashioned 
methods. 



[113] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Very little has been published on stammering from the 
psychoanalytic point of view. See "Stammering as a 
Psychoneurosis" by Isador H. Coriat, Journal of Abnor- 
mal Psychology, Vol. IX, No. 6, and "Stammering as a 
Psychoneurosis and Its Treatment by Psychoanalysis" by 
M. D. Eder, Int. Med. Congress, Section of Psychiatry. 
Tr. XVII. See also A. Appelt: "Stammering and Its 
Permanent Cure." 1912. 



[114] 



CHAPTER III. SCAPEGOATS 

Ever since man appeared on the earth he has 
felt the necessity of scapegoats. Frazer's monu- 
mental work "The Golden Bough" reveals thou- 
sands of obvious or subtle attempts on the part of 
mankind to saddle the responsibility for individual 
or group shortcomings on some unwilling or willing 
sacrificial victim, beast, man or god. 

The Greek drama blamed fate, the Middle Ages 
the devil; one civilization sacrificed a goat whose 
death wiped off the sins of men; in another civiliza- 
tion, Jesus died to save mankind. 

In our days, we no longer accuse the devil of 
causing our failures. "Popular science" spread 
thinly by Sunday newspapers and club lectures, 
supplies the masses with new impressive scapegoats. 

"Racial traits," "inbreeding," "heredity," "en- 
vironment," have been in a most hypocritical way 
substituted for the goat of old. 

The pagan who sinned and, afraid of the im- 
pending reckoning, killed a goat in order to mol- 
lify some heavenly policeman, did not deny his 

[115] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



guilt. The modern "sinner" who seeks excuses for 
his brutality or his lewdness in his heredity or his 
environment, is guilty of a much more complete 
flight from reality. 

The pagan admitted that sinning was pleasant but 
could not be indulged in unless there was. one 
more goat to be offered to the gods. The 
modern sinner is consciously in fear of sin, but 
unconsciously preparing his escape by heaping 
up guilt upon vague biological processes which he 
does not understand. 

The pagan said: "I did not repress certain 
cravings and I am willing to pay the price." The 
modern sinner on the other hand says: "I could 
not repress certain cravings, because my ancestry, 
my bringing up or my environment have made it 
impossible for me to suppress such cravings." 

If the modern sinner has a conscience, such a 
disclaimer of guilt may be perfectly honest and 
straightforward and constitute for the person mak- 
ing it a great danger. 

The hypocrite who exploits heredity and other 
scapegoats as a convenient explanation for the 
gratification of his own cravings is probably safe. 
The ethically-minded person who believes that his 
heredity or some other biological factor has un- 
fitted him to repress unsocial, inadmissible crav- 
[116] 



Pseudo-heredity 



ings may undergo very torturing "soul struggles" 
and be defeated in life's battle. 

Physical heredity cannot be denied and Mendel's 
experiments prove that it is ruled by absolute 
mathematical laws. Not only do we observe in 
nature that certain characteristics of the parents are 
reproduced in an invariable proportion of the off- 
spring, but we can, before crossing certain animal 
or vegetable species, predict accurately how many 
of the offspring will present certain characters and 
how many will not present such characters. 

This is as far as heredity goes. The transmis- 
sion of mental characteristics is probably due to 
what Freud calls pseudo-heredity, that is to the in- 
fluence wielded on the child by its environment, that 
environment consisting chiefly of the parents for the 
first years of the child's life. 

Biologists generally agree that while inherited 
characters or congenital characters cannot be modi- 
fied, acquired characters can be caused to disap- 
pear in later life. 

Those who consider themselves as "burdened 
with a bad heredity" should ponder that fact. 
They should remember that even a weak or defec- 
tive organ, stomach or lungs, may be, not inherited 
from the parents, but acquired under the same un- 
favourable circumstances which caused that in- 

[117] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



feriority to establish itself in their parents' organ- 
ism. 

A changed environment, proper exercise and 
plenty of food have been known, together with imi- 
tation of the proper model, to modify entirely the 
physical appearance of various races. 

I have mentioned elsewhere that the so-called 
hereditary instincts can be absolutely "removed" 
by the influence of the environment. 

When a messenger pigeon refuses to mate with 
its kind if hatched by a ring dove and then will only 
mate with ring doves, we must come to the conclu- 
sion that training is stronger than instinct. 

When we observe that a change 4 in temperature 
either shortens or prolongs the average life of a 
certain species or creates a different species, we 
must also conclude that environment is stronger 
than heredity. 

Eggs from the same butterfly or puppae of the 
same species will give entirely different species 
at different temperatures. 

The number of "hereditary characters" is de- 
creasing year after year as scientists become more 
thorough in their observations and include in their 
statistics a growing number of factors. 

It was admitted for centuries that some inherited 
[118] 



Fishes and Carbonic Acid 



instinct caused fishes to rise to the surface of the 
waters at night and to go down to the bottom at 
dawn. 

We know now that heredity has nothing to do 
with that phenomenon. 

The presence of carbonic acid in water causes 
all aquatic animals to direct themselves toward the 
source of light. At night the waters of pools and 
rivers become charged with carbonic acid as the 
green aquatic plants cannot absorb that gas in the 
dark. Fishes and other organisms are affected by 
that excess of carbonic acid and are compelled to 
rise to the surface where the light, however feeble, 
is stronger than at the bottom. 

In the morning, the supply of acid decreases 
rapidly and all the organisms regain their freedom 
and can seek safety in the deeper strata of the 
water. 

By liberating large quantities of carbonic acid 
in the water during the day, one can compel all the 
aquatic organisms to rise to the surface, and by 
directing at night a strong light on the waters, which 
facilitates the absorption of carbonic acid by green 
plants, one can, on the contrary, cause the fishes 
to remain at the bottom. 

It is not improbable that in a few years, many 

[119] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



obscure facts attributed to heredity or to instincts 
will be traced to physical or chemical phenomena 
which can be produced or removed at will. 

A French scientist, Pouchet, has noticed that cer- 
tain fishes reproduce the colour or pattern of the 
aquarium in which they are kept provided they 
can see it. Blind fishes of the same species, kept 
in the same aquarium, retain the whitish or greyish 
colour they had when they first came out of the 
egg. The so-called protective colouring of certain 
animals, the seasonal changes observed in the plu- 
mage of the ptarmigan, may not be more than mere 
unconscious imitation of the environment, devoid 
of any purpose. A very illuminating case of what 
we might call metachemistry. 

Insanity, feeble-mindedness or criminality are 
not inherited characters. They are often acquired 
through either imitation or suggestion or both. 

The insane and the criminal solve their problems 
by following the line of least resistance and least 
effort. The children they bring up are likely, un- 
less some healthier influence is exerted on them, 
to solve their problems in the same way, the only 
way which observation has made thoroughly fa- 
miliar to them. 

Auto-suggestion and involuntary suggestion by 
[120] 



Stupid Relatives 



others play a powerful part in the acquisition of 
criminal or neurotic traits. In a crisis, the in- 
dividual weakened by his superstitious belief in 
heredity, may either commit a crime or merge into 
a neurosis because his father, mother or grand- 
father established such a precedent. 

That precedent may not be more than a legend 
perpetuated by inaccurate, stupid or gossipy rela- 
tives. 

A man guilty of some act of brutality is easily 
catalogued in family archives as a man of criminal 
instincts. A man of rather morose disposition very 
often has his trouble diagnosed by amateur psy- 
chiatrists in his family circle as melancholia. 

A romantic legend may form after his death 
around his actual biography and invest some de- 
tail of behaviour, which on one occasion impressed 
the beholders, with the dignity of a life-long habit 
or of a serious mental disturbance. 

The stupid parent who vents his anger on his 
offspring by making remarks such as "You are 
as crazy as your father (mother, uncle, aunt)," 
"You will end in jail as your uncle did," may start 
a train of suggestive thought which is highly danger- 
ous. 

I have known personally three brothers who were 

[121] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



brought up by an exceptionally idiotic mother and 
who on several occasions had themselves committed 
to an insane asylum when they lost their money or 
their jobs. None of them succeeded in remaining 
"insane" for any length of time, although all of 
them repeated constantly that they were "going 
crazy like their father." Inquiry showed that their 
father, who died when they were very young, had 
several fits of blues coinciding with slumps in the 
family's finances but never showed at any time any 
"insane" traits. 

Men and women have been known to reproduce 
in their behaviour certain habits bad or good of 
their grandparents. Investigation showed in many 
of them, and would probably have shown in every 
one of them, that they were obsessed by the old be- 
lief that genius or vice, etc., "skips a generation." 

"Racial psychology," a limited form of "men- 
tal" heredity, is, like heredity proper, a weapon 
directed against our enemies and a scapegoat for 
our own sins. To the honest psychologist, so-called 
racial traits amount merely to different sets of bad 
manners tolerated or encouraged in one community, 
discouraged and held shameful in other communi- 
ties owing to reasons of temperature, climate, food 
supply, etc. 

The unconscious make-up of all races, however, 
[122] 



Unions Between Blood Relations 



is the same the world over as a careful analysis of 
all folk traditions, legends, religions, superstitions, 
ritual, neurotic psychology, etc., proves abundantly. 
It is as silly to expect a certain form of behaviour 
from one individual because he is a Jew or an 
Irishman as it would be for a Jew or an Irishman 
to excuse a certain form of behaviour of his on the 
plea that his antecedents determined certain psy- 
chological processes. 

Inbreeding is another cause for worry which 
neurotics are likely to seize upon as a conscious 
screen for their unconscious strivings to escape 
reality. 

There is absolutely no evidence of a scientific 
nature that the marriage of blood relations is pro- 
ductive of insanity or feeble-mindedness in the 
offspring. 

But there are good reasons to suspect that feeble- 
mindedness leads to unions between blood relations 
and in many cases to incestuous unions. Parent 
fixation being stronger in neurotics than in normal 
individuals, the family complex is bound to attract 
related neurotics to each other. The result is that 
the children whom they procreate may be born 
normal but are brought up by their neurotic parents 
to adopt neurotic forms of action and thought. 

Goddard, who has made exhaustive studies of 

[123] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



feeble-mindedness, has reached the conclusion that 
the feeble-minded are constantly thrown together, 
congregate in certain places and intermarry more 
than normal individuals. 

That each neurotic family trains its children to 
one peculiar form of abnormal behaviour is well 
illustrated by the history of the sinister Juke family 
propagated by incestuous descendance: all the 
descendants of Ada were criminals, the descendants 
of Belle, exhibitionists or rapists, the descendants 
of Effie, beggars. 

As against the tragic results of inbreeding among 
the inferior, we may remind the reader of the re- 
markable results of inbreeding among individuals 
of superior stock. 

In Athens and her suburban communities be- 
tween 530 and 430 b. c, that is during the heyday 
of Hellenic brilliancy, there was a small popula- 
tion from which came about fifteen of the most 
remarkable geniuses the world has ever known. 

Inbreeding was the custom, marriage with half- 
sisters being lawful, and unions with aliens being 
discouraged. 

The decline of the Hellenic civilization was not 
brought about by any racial decay but by the over- 
whelming pressure of primitive races of a more 
savage type invading a highly cultured region much 
[124] 



Re-education Possible 



as the desert sand gradually invaded the centres of 
culture of Mesopotamia and North Africa. 

Some of the most wonderful specimens of agri- 
cultural products or animal breeds have been ob- 
tained through continual inbreeding. It is not 
therefore inbreeding which influences the mental 
quality, nor even the fact that one of the parents or 
both are neurotically inclined, but the fact that 
children are trained in a neurotic way. 

Re-education, however, mental or physical, is 
fortunately a possibility which should never be 
overlooked. 

We are born with general physical tendencies, 
that is, we reproduce closely the general type of 
the human variety to which we belong. We receive 
the bony, muscular and nervous structure of what 
will, according to the pains we take, become a 
statue or a scarecrow. 

Imitation is mostly unconscious and a negative 
way of dealing with problems. Our parents are 
the first models presented to us by nature while 
we are casting about for some one to imitate. But 
they need not remain the only models from which 
we shall shape our statue. 

Our parents may have fleshless limbs and poor 
lungs. But we can go to a gynasium, run around 
the track, lift weights, breathe fresh air, at least 

[125] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 






all night long, regulate our diet scientifically, walk 
to and from work. 

Our parents may be abnormal mentally, but li- 
braries, lecture halls and meeting places will bring 
us into contact with active men and women who are 
normal and whom we can imitate, dispelling thereby 
the mental ghosts who thrive in the home atmos- 
phere. 

Animals are creatures of their environment and 
according to whether that environment is favourable 
or unfavourable, they die out or survive. Ma a is 
the creator of his environment and can change his 
surroundings at will. 

Most of our heredity is a pseudo-heredity which, 
being simply the shaping influence of our environ- 
ment, can be defeated as soon as we realize that it 
is not working for our welfare. 

One question every one of us must ask himself 
frequently is: "Am, I myself, or am I imitating 
some one and if I am imitating some one, am I fol- 
lowing the line of least resistance?" 

Another question is: "Do I believe in a certain 
thing or have I accepted this belief at some one's 
suggestion, and if so, what necessary task am I 
trying to shirk?" 

One of Kempf's patients let her parents bring her 
up as a perfectly irresponsible woman and later, 
[126] 



Fate and the Devil 



when that irresponsibility made her married life 
very unpleasant, instead of re-educating herself and 
solving her problems in a positive, constructive 
way, she accepted her relatives' dictum that "she 
w T as crazy," and became "crazy." 

Kempf re-educated her; after becoming herself, 
she threw off the yoke of suggestion imposed upon 
her by silly relatives. 

The day when the combined power of imitation 
and. suggestion is realized, the knowledge of our 
abr,jrmal ascendance will not trouble us. Instead 
of discouraging us and of causing us to say neu- 
rotically: "What can I do against such odds?" 
we shall study carefully the ways in which our 
progenitors or parents deviated from the normal 
standard and consciously train ourselves to avoid 
their physical and mental errors. 

Heredity shall cease to be a menace and shall be- 
come in certain cases a warning and a guide. 

When insight has delivered us from the absurd 
belief in fate, in the devil or some other overpower- 
ing metaphysical force which shall crush us and 
compel us to do what unconsciously we are crav- 
ing to do, we shall be better off for an accurate 
knowledge of our so-called hereditary handicaps. 
We shall not allow ourselves to use them neuroti- 
cally as scapegoats. 

[127] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 

William White's "Mechanisms of Character Forma- 
tion " will enable the average reader to complete a picture 
which, owing to lack of space, had to remain rather 
sketchy. Advanced students should read the fourth part 
of J. G. Frazer's "Golden Bough" entitled "The Scape- 
goat" in order to fathom the psychology which has made 
scapegoats necessary. 

The latest data on heredity can be found in two 
extremely technical volumes published under the auspices 
of the Rockefeller Institute, East and Jones "Inbreeding 
and Outbreeding" (Lippincott) and T. H. Morgan "The 
Physical Basis of Heredity" (Lippincott). 



[128] 



CHAPTER IV. DUAL PERSONALITIES 

Every human being has two personalities: an 
archaic, primitive, childlike, unadapted personal- 
ity, and a modern, sophisticated, adult, and, to all 
appearances, adapted personality. 

Civilization and education have superimposed 
the second over the first or rather built over the first 
a thin crust of manners which does not permit its 
sharp angles to protrude. 

When the operation of walling in the archaic per- 
sonality is performed in a bungling way some of its 
sharp points have a tendency to crop out and when 
civilization tries to force back all those sharp points 
by exerting on the thin crust a pressure which it 
cannot bear, the archaic personality breaks through 
entirely and for a certain period of time refuses 
to be buried again. 

Psychiatrists of the old school were extremely 
puzzled by cases of double personality and some 
spoke of dissociation of the brain, of two separate 
brains, of wrong associations of neurons or cell 
groups, etc. 

[129] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



To the psychoanalyst, a case of double personal- 
ity is not any more mysterious than the simplest of 
our day or night dreams. 

It is a neurosis which offers to the subject a 
means of escape from reality, which enables him 
to regress to a mode of life in which some or all 
of his responsibilities are removed, and which in 
no essential detail is different from the various 
forms of "insanity" for which psychiatrists have 
devised impressive and meaningless designations. 

A brief review of the best known cases of double 
personality will help me to make my point clear. 

The Rev. Ansel Bourne was a hard working 
clergyman of excellent character and reputation, 
enjoying the confidence of all his associates. His 
health was good and his muscular strength and 
endurance normal. Since childhood he had been 
subject to fits of "blues," and became easily de- 
pressed. 

One day he drew $500 from a bank in Provi- 
dence, boarded a Pawtucket car and disappeared 
for two months. Then his nephew in Providence 
received a telegram saying that a man claiming to 
be Rev. Ansel Bourne was in Norristown, Pa., act- 
ing strangely. 

The m^an was not acting strangely, but very 
normally. He was in reality the Rev. Ansel 
[130] 



He Wanted Rest 



Bourne, who suddenly had found himself in a 
strange town and in a small fruit store. 

Six weeks before his awakening, Bourne had 
gone to Norristown, rented a small store, stocked 
it with candy and fruit and had been doing business 
as A. Brown, living in the back of his shop where 
he cooked his own meals. His manners never at- 
tracted any one's attention. He went regularly to 
church, and once, at a prayer meeting, made a 
rather good address. 

When the awakening came and he regained his 
former personality, he was very weak and had 
lost over twenty pounds in weight. 

William James examined him and induced him 
to submit to hypnotism. In hypnosis the Brown 
personality came to the fore with surprising readi- 
ness and with such insistence that the subject could 
not remember any of the facts of his life as Ansel 
Bourne. 

Brown didn't even "know" Ansel Bourne and 
repeated constantly that he felt "hedged in at both 
ends." He could not remember any of the inci- 
dents preceding the ride to Pawtucket, nor any of 
those following his awakening in Norristown. The 
only explanation he gave for his escapade was that 
"there was trouble back there" and "he wanted 
rest." 



[131] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



In this case the first personality did not know 
the second, nor did the second know the first. 

In other cases one of the personalities was ac- 
quainted with the other, or both knew each other 
and in one case there was a distinct feeling of scorn 
and hatred, in the other a deep friendship mani- 
fested by both personalities for each other. 

Miss Beauchamp, studied by Morton Prince, was 
a serious minded person, fond of books and study, 
very idealistic, "with a morbid New England con- 
scientiousness" and a great deal of pride and re- 
serve, very unwilling to expose herself or her life 
to any one's scrutiny. 

One day "owing to some nervous excitement" she 
became an entirely different personality. She 
called herself Sally, a creature full of fun, unable 
to take anything seriously, scorning books and 
churchgoing, eager for all forms of amusement, 
lacking all the educational accomplishments of Miss 
Beauchamp, such as a knowledge of foreign lan- 
guages and stenography. 

Miss Beauchamp was a neurasthenic, Sally was 
always well, never fatigued and never seemed to 
suffer pain. 

During the first year, Miss Beauchamp and Sally 
constantly alternated with one another. Whenever 
Miss Beauchamp felt tired or upset, Sally used to 
[132] 



Sally s Sense of Humor 



appear, sometimes for a few minutes, sometimes 
for several hours. Later, Sally's appearances 
lasted several days at a time. 

Miss Beauchamp never knew Sally, but Sally 
knew everything about Miss Beauchamp. Further- 
more Sally hated her and said so very frankly. 

She went as far as playing tricks on her to annoy 
her. She would mail to Miss Beauchamp a box 
full of spiders and snakes, she would ride to the 
end of a trolley line without return carfare and 
oblige her to walk miles or beg rides from passing 
wagons; she would unravel her knitting, she wrote 
her annoying letters, etc. 

Alma Z., observed for ten years by Dr. Osgood 
Mason, had been in robust health until her 18th 
year, when "owing to overwork at school," she 
underwent a curious change. She had been until 
then an educated, thoughtful, dignified, feminine 
type. She suddenly became a cheerful, sprightly, 
childish person, ungrammatical, and using a pecu- 
liarly limited vocabulary. 

She called herself Twoey and referred to her first 
personality as No. 1. Twoey would at first only 
remain a few hours but later her stay was pro- 
longed to several days. 

While "1" and "2" were apparently in every 
respect separate and distinct personalities, each 

[133] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



took up life and its occupations where the other had 
left off. 

Twoey knew "No. 1" well and "No. 1" became 
acquainted with Twoey through the descriptions 
given her by others. 

The two personalities became great friends. 
Twoey admired "No. 1" for her superior knowl- 
edge, her patience in suffering and the lovely quali- 
ties which she recognized and she willingly took her 
place to give her rest. 

"No. 1" also became fond of Twoey on account 
of the loving care she bestowed upon her and her 
affairs and for her witty sayings which she greatly 
enjoyed. 

As Alma Z.'s health improved, Twoey's visits 
became scarce, and only coincided with conditions 
of extreme fatigue or mental excitement. 

Then Alma married and became an excellent 
wife and an efficient mistress of the household. 

One night, however, Twoey re-appeared but 
merely to announce that she was to disappear and 
that another personality, "The Boy," would take 
her place. The Boy submitted to all the duties 
which Alma had to discharge but when questioned 
persisted in declaring her male and youthful char- 
acter. Alma knew Latin, mathematics, and 
philosophy, she had memorized entire poems by 
[134] 



What Music Did 



Tennyson, Browning and Scott. The Boy was 
absolutely ignorant, although he had an intelligent 
grasp of affairs and manifested a keen enjoyment 
of theatrical and musical performances. 

One evening at a concert in the Metropolitan 
Opera House, the Boy suddenly disappeared and 
Alma returned for a few minutes, but Alma soon 
closed her eyes and assumed the harsher, more 
masculine countenance of her boyish personality. 

The Boy knew Twoey and "No. 1" and liked 
both of them. Like Twoey he expressed a constant 
desire that "No. 1" should get well and not need 
him any more. 

Ansel Bourne had regressed to a lower intel- 
lectual level, but remained on an adult level. Miss 
Beauchamp and Alma Z. regressed to childhood. 
In the case of Mary Reynolds, we will observe a 
regression to infancy and in that of the Rev. Thomas 
Carson Hanna, to the condition of the newborn. 

Mary Reynolds, treated by Dr. S. Weir Mitchell, 
was a shy, morose, melancholy woman. She had 
suffered frequently from convulsions, loss of con- 
sciousness, loss of sight and hearing. 

After having been greatly weakened by a severe 
attack, she fell into a deep sleep from which she 
could not at first be aroused. 

On awaking she was found to have lost all her 

[135] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



former knowledge, to be unable to recognize her 
environment or any of her friends. 

She still knew how to eat, drink and walk, but 
she could neither speak nor understand spoken 
words. She was an infant, mumbling disconnected 
words. In her second state she was gay, lively and 
playful. 

The transition from "1" to "2" always took place 
at night, that from "2" to "1" during the day time. 

No case has been more completely described than 
that of Rev. Thomas Carson Hanna, treated by Dr. 
Boris Sidis and Dr. S. P. Goodhart. 

Rev. Hanna had never suffered from any illness 
up to his twenty-fourth year when the slight acci- 
dent, following which his personality changed, took 
place. 

He was a versatile man, endowed with not only 
intellectual, but mechanical ability, showing artis- 
tic taste in many directions; he had a strong will 
and perfect self-control. He was not demonstrative 
in his affections and was influenced more easily by 
reason than by emotion. 

One evening, returning home in his carriage, he 
lost his footing while alighting, fell head foremost 
and remained unconscious for two hours. When 
he regained his consciousness he had become as 
helpless as a newborn infant. He could neither 
[136] 



Return to Infancy 



speak nor understand what was said to him. He 
did not know how to control his voluntary muscles, 
he could not walk. He had no conception of dis- 
tance or time. 

When food was offered to him he did not under- 
stand the purpose of it; nor, when it was placed in 
his mouth, did he know how to masticate and swal- 
low it. It was only when food was forced upon 
him and thrust far back into the pharynx and reflex 
swallowing movements excited, that he realized the 
purpose of food and learned the way of taking it. 

Like an infant, he satisfied his natural needs 
without regard to time or place. Like an infant, 
he began to learn a few words by imitating definite 
articulate sounds made in connection with certain 
objects. The first word he learnt was "apple" 
which to him meant all kinds of food. 

His intelligence, however, was that of an adult. 
His memory was excellent. A word once heard 
seemed indelibly impressed on his mind and he 
never again forgot it. 

Like an infant, he was trying to grasp things be- 
yond his reach, such as a tree he saw out of the win- 
dow. Like an infant, he did not at first discrimi- 
nate between his motions and those of other people. 
Nor did he analyse complicated objects into their 
component parts; a man, a man on a bicycle, and a 

[137] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



man sitting in a buggy were to him three different 
kinds of men. Life and motion were at first 
synonymous to him. 

He gradually learnt to speak, to walk, to sing 
and to play instruments hut he only knew the things 
he had studied since his change of personality had 
taken place. Everything and everybody he had 
known previous to that time was absolutely forgot- 
ten. Once, the reading aloud to him of a Hebrew 
passage with which he was familiar brought to con- 
sciousness a flow of Hebrew quotations which he, 
however, did not understand. 

Seven weeks after the accident, about three 
o'clock in the morning, he awoke to find himself 
in a strange house in New York City. He de- 
manded explanations from his brother who was 
sharing his room. 

When Dr. Goodhart, at whose house he was 
staying, came into the room he took him for a per- 
fect stranger. 

All memory of the events intervening between 
April 15 at seven o'clock in the evening and June 
8 in the early morning had faded. 

In fact he resumed his conscious life at the very 
hour of the day when he had sunk into unconscious- 
ness and insisted that it must be evening. On the 
other hand, he recounted as a part of his actual 
[138] 






The Final Crisis 



life some of the incidents of which he had been 
dreaming in hypnoidie states of his second person- 
ality. 

On June 9 about 4 p. M. he fell asleep and when 
he awoke he had relapsed into his second person- 
ality. This time, however, he merely continued 
the life he had led before in that state and carried 
on the memories of it. He had not regressed fur- 
ther than that. 

He gained much insight into his condition and, 
when told by his brother of his various changes 
of personality, appeared greatly depressed. He 
asked anxiously whether there would not be a third 
state in which he would not remember either his 
normal or his second personalities. 

All sorts of stimulation were resorted to, from 
chemicals to a variety performance, in order to 
arouse his mental activity. In his secondary state, 
the young clergyman enjoyed keenly the antics of 
the performers, drank beer with pleasure, etc. 

After innumerable changes of personality, gener- 
ally preceded by sleep, Hanna merged on June 14 
into a curious state resembling mental stupor. To 
questions put to him and bearing upon his two dif- 
ferent personalities he answered very slowly and 
with great difficulty as though he were in both states 
at the same time. 

[139] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



For several days he remained in that condition; 
gradually his mind became clear and he informed 
the physicians treating him that he had passed 
through an intense mental struggle. The two per- 
sonalities, his normal and his second personalities, 
arose simultaneously and confronted each other. 
Each of them was Hanna and yet they were different 
from each other. He could not choose one only 
because both were of the same nature ; and yet they 
were too dissimilar to be joined. 

Each personality rose and fell in turn. "The 
struggle," he said to his physicians, "was not so 
much to choose one as to forget the other. I was 
trying to find out which I might most easily forget. 
It seemed impossible to forget one; both tried to per- 
sist in consciousness. It seemed as if each memory 
was stronger than my will, and still I had to deter- 
mine which to drive away. Just before lunch, 
yesterday, in the psychological laboratory, I chose 
the secondary life; it was strong and fresh and was 
able to persist. ... At that time the question arose 
whether I could not possibly take both. ... I 
decided to accept both lives as mine, a condition 
that could not be worse than the uncertainty I was 
in. I then felt that the oft-repeated struggle would 
ruin my mind. . . . / am sure both are mine. 
They are separate and I cannot yet fit the two 
[140] 



What Preceded the Change 



well together. . . . Secondary and primary states 
have breaks and intervals in them, as though there 
were periods of sleep. The secondary state is 
stronger and brighter, but not more stable" 

Harmony gradually re-entered Hanna's mind 
and the two personalities were merged into a new 
and healthy one, a compromise between the over- 
worked, overcivilized, over-repressed man of yore 
and the primitive, uncivilized and unadapted child 
who for three months had tried to prevail. 

In all but one of the cases I have reviewed and in 
many others which can be found in the literature of 
the subject, the change in personality was preceded 
by some "crisis." The crisis is not mentioned in 
Hanna's case but might have been found if the 
psychiatrists treating the patient had inquired into 
the events preceding the "accident." They prob- 
ably, as was usual in those days (1897), considered 
the accident as the primary factor in the mental 
derangement. Hanna's fall may have been, how- 
ever, what Freud calls a semi-intentional self- 
inflicted injury. 

Ansel Bourne was fleeing from "trouble back 
there" and "wanted rest," Miss Beauchamp was 
overcome by "some nervous excitement," Alma Z. 
was a victim of "overwork," Mary Reynolds had 
been weakened "by a severe attack." 

[141] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



In every case the subject, instead of evolving into 
a more complex, more intelligent, more developed 
personality, regressed to a more primitive one. 
The change implied an easier mode of living, fewer 
duties and responsibilities. 

In the case of Alma Z., "The Boy" was obviously 
trying to save the normal personality from wifely 
duties. A. Brown, fruit dealer, avoided much of 
the mental exertion Rev. Bourne had to undergo. 
Sallie did not have to live up to the intellectual 
standard Miss Beauchamp had set for herself. 
Mary Reynolds and Hanna, becoming infants, let 
the world minister to all their needs. 

Every change of personality either took place 
at night or after a period of sleep, the second per- 
sonality appearing preferably at night, the normal 
personality re-appearing preferably in the day time. 
The second personality assumes the aspect of a pro- 
tracted dream, and the fact that it appeared at 
night in so many cases, lends credibility to that 
view. 

The second personality appears in every case as a 
morbid wish- fulfilment, as a negative striving along 
a fictitious life-line, along the line of least resist- 
ance. Every one of the subjects observed was 
probably a person harassed and worn out by either 
monotonous tasks or an exaggerated sense of duty. 
[142] 



Leading an Easier Life 



The playful or infantile personalities into which 
they merged temporarily, took abnormally the vaca- 
tion they themselves should have taken normally. 

They all had repressed, if not over-repressed, 
the old Adam, and the old Adam avenged himself 
by bursting forth and assuming the upper hand. 
How many cases of so-called "insanity" are simply 
due to the persistency of a second personality 
which happens to be too violent or absurd to be 
tolerable in its environment. A patient now con- 
fined at Ward's Island became insane after being 
hit on the head by a small tin can which did not 
even abrase the skin. A journeyman before the 
accident, he has become a famous opera singer 
and holds frequent conversations with God. He, 
too, has entered an easier life, doing no manual 
labour, enjoying a prestige he could never aspire to 
in his former occupation and unburdened of the 
care of his family; the fulfilment of a dream which 
may have originated in the unconscious moments 
following the accident; another case in which the 
accident seems to have been a "pretext" seized by 
the unconscious rather than a positive cause. 

The more things we lack in our waking states, 
the more things we shall expect and receive from 
our dreams, but many of our dream accomplish- 
ments are archaic, regressive, infantile. Not in- 

[143] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



frequently when our conscious self deprives itself 
of gratifications which human nature craves, our 
unconscious self overpowers it and proceeds to lead 
even in our waking states a more human, more 
comfortable, sort of life. Like all the results of 
violent upheavals, however, that life is likely to be 
unbalanced and unadapted to our environment. 
The ascetic saints who, in their scorn of the flesh, 
fled into the desert, were a prey to horrible halluci- 
nations in which they beheld all the obscenities 
which consciously they had been avoiding but for 
which they unconsciously had been craving. 

Our archaic, unconscious self is a lusty caveman 
whose cravings modern civilization can no longer 
satisfy. He must, however, be appeased now and 
then by being given a sop of some sort. Starving 
him can only bring about his revolt; his attempts 
to free himself may mean sick headaches, hysteria, 
obsessions, phobias, "insanity" or the appearance 
of a new man in the body of the old, the domination 
of a second personality for a more or less extended 
period of time. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Sidis and Goodhart, "Multiple Personality" (Apple- 
ton) will supply the reader with a history of the best 
known cases. Neither of the authors is a psychoanalyst, 

[144] 



Bibliography 



one of them, Dr. Sidis, being in fact, bitterly opposed 
to that science. 

Their observations, however, are very valuable and 
do not in any way contradict those made by exponents of 
psychoanalysis. 



[145] 



CHAPTER V. HOW ONE WOMAN BECAME 

INSANE 

Psychoanalysts seldom have the opportunity of 
treating any of the "great psychoses." The patient 
who has lost all insight into his mental condition 
is generally confined in an institution and few in- 
sane asylums have analysts on their medical staff. 

One case treated by Dr. Kempf at St. Elizabeth 
Hospital, Washington, D. C, offers good evidence 
that many apparently "desperate" cases could be 
cured by the psychoanalytic technique. 

If an abstract of that case is presented to the 
reader, it is not merely owing to the success which 
crowned Dr. Kempf 's efforts, but because it offers, 
besides, a striking and grewsome picture of the 
process by which people are at times "driven to in- 
sanity." 

It shows how well-meaning associates, lacking in 
sympathy and understanding, beset with many 
prejudices and affected by complexes of their own, 
may gradually make reality so unbearable for a 
weaker individual that he unconsciously seeks to 
[146] 



A Puritanical Father 



escape it by the door which leads to an insane 
asylum. 

The various relapses which Kempf 's patient suf- 
fered before she regained her normal balance il- 
lustrate perhaps more impressively than any other 
detail of the case that process of abnormal escape 
from unpleasant situations. 

The influence which education may have in de- 
termining the content of psychopathic fancies 
was made very clear by the analysis of Kempf's 
patient. 

The patient was a young woman of twenty-four, 
married and the mother of a child. She was the 
youngest of several children. 

Her father was an engineer, a hard-worker, sav- 
ing to the point of being stingy and obsessed by the 
fear of being destitute in his old age. He loved 
his children but tended to conflict with them owing 
to his prudishness. All sexual topics were taboo 
in his home. He berated his daughters when they 
sat with their legs crossed, he objected to their wear- 
ing kimonos. He owned some houses in a distant 
city which were for a time, through no fault of his 
own, converted into brothels. 

In his later years he depended upon his oldest 
daughter to manage his affairs and persistently in- 
clined to treat the youngest as a child. At the 

[147] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



time of the patient's illness, he was about seventy 
years old and suffering from chronic gastritis. 

The mother was a "nervous," kind, home loving 
woman, tall and heavy, and extremely fond of eat- 
ing. She, like her husband, encouraged her oldest 
daughter to be self-reliant and, on the other hand, 
trained her youngest daughter to depend upon her 
in every way, introducing her to visitors as the 
baby. She never allowed the "baby" to have any 
initiative and imposed her will upon her in all mat- 
ters, telling her what style and material to select 
for her clothes, what to wear for the day, how to 
act, to whom to talk, etc. 

Like her husband, she also excluded from her 
conversation all matters pertaining to sex and never 
tolerated any intimate confidence on the part of 
her children. The patient was whipped at the age 
of eleven for asking her mother about the meaning 
of a word she read in a toilet and for relating to 
her her fancies in connection with that word. 

The patient's oldest sister was mentally and 
physically very like the mother and she, too, de- 
manded constant submission to her decisions and 
opinions on the part of the patient. 

In other words the patient's training had un- 
fitted her for self-reliance and efficiency in real 
life. She was perfectly satisfied with that arrang 
[148] 



Prurient Modesty 



merit and even was inclined to treat her own in- 
efficiency and irresponsibility as a joke. She was 
a lazy and rather obese type of girl. Her educa- 
tion was never planned systematically and she 
missed many school days on whimsical pretexts. 

Her early curiosity in regard to sexual problems 
only met with rebuke and on several occasions with 
punishment. 

Her parents' prudishness only increased her in- 
terest in all things pertaining to reproduction. 
She watched excitedly cats, dogs, chickens, horses 
and derived much secret enjoyment from her ob- 
servation of their sexual behaviour. On the other 
hand she would be morbidly embarrassed by the 
sight of a woman nursing a child. 

Her father considered it indecent for her to sit 
on his lap. When her sister began to menstruate 
and she tried to secure information as to that phe- 
nomenon, her mother scolded her and sent her to 
her room. She felt then that she lived on a plane 
beneath her mother and her sister and she devel- 
oped a distinct feeling of inferiority. 

She trained herself never to ask questions be- 
cause they might expose her thoughts and she would 
iitfeve remained in absolute ignorance of sexual 
£icts but for the romantic stories told her by a 
floured maid who had been employed once in a 

[149] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



house of prostitution. Those stories simply set her 
imagination on fire and far from enlightening her, 
caused her to derive sexual suggestions from al- 
most everything in her environment, the behaviour 
of her father and mother, the sight of attractive 
women, etc. 

At twenty-one, she married a young man whose 
family was in almost every respect quite the op- 
posite of her own. 

His father was also an engineer, but younger 
than the patient's father, a free spender and fond 
of gay parties. 

The patient's mother-in-law was a handsome 
woman with a girlish figure, small feet and ankles, 
well dressed, who had travelled a good deal and 
had a wide range of interests. She was proud of 
her youthful appearance and dieted in order to 
keep herself attractive looking. 

The patient's husband was a slender man who 
at thirty had the figure of a wiry, active boy of 
twenty. He also was an engineer, ambitious, 
earnest, spoiled by his mother, and at times irrita- 
ble and impulsive. 

During their engagement, the patient never al- 
lowed her fiance to kiss her or to put his arm 
around her. She was terribly upset and almost 
gave him up when he confessed to her that he had 
[150] 



The Husband 9 s Plight 



had a hard struggle with his desire to masturbate 
and had consorted with other girls. She never 
communicated her wish to desert him to any one 
then but later in her psychose felt sure that their 
marriage was not legal. 

At that time she finally demanded that her 
mother enlighten her as to the origin of children 
and she felt extremely shocked by her mother's 
explanation and always hated her in later life for 
having deceived her so long. 

After the novelty of their relation and the ex- 
citement attendant upon the first months of mar- 
ried life had worn away, her husband began to be 
disturbed by what he called "asinine thoughts." 
He could not understand why dainty feet, hairless 
limbs, small firm breasts and a small abdomen 
(his mother's characteristics) should prove so at- 
tractive to him and why large soft breasts, a large 
abdomen, heavy feet and ankles and hairy limbs 
(his wife's characteristics) should prove sexually 
depressing. 

He was undoubtedly conscious of his mother- 
fixation and in his more or less conscious endeavour 
to escape incest had selected for his mate the op- 
posite type of a woman. His mother-fixation was 
clearly revealed by incestuous dreams which pur- 
sued him even after his marriage. 

[151] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



He was greatly relieved later when told of the 
simple biological significance of such dreams. 
Realizing obscurely to what causes his growing sex- 
ual indifference to his wife was due, he tried to in- 
duce her to diet, to exercise (in order to reduce 
her abdomen and breasts) and to remove the hair 
from her ankles. After a while she gave up those 
practices which would have made her a little more 
similar to the mother-image and became careless 
about her appearance. 

The two families did not harmonize at all. Her 
family appeared too coarse and bigoted to her hus- 
band's family which in turn was scorned by her 
family for its freer views and extravagance. The 
two families naturally made the unfortunate young 
woman their common battle ground because she 
was weak and unsophisticated. 

Her husband caused her much distress by threat- 
ening to leave her if she lost her beauty, if she did 
not take better care of her appearance, or did not 
write to him daily when he was away. 

Her sexual life was naturally very unsatisfac- 
tory and she masturbated during her pregnancy, 
after which she was overwhelmed with shame. To 
make matters worse, her sister told her that mas- 
turbation was a symptom of insanity. She was 
obsessed by the fear that her child might inherit 
[152] 



Dangerous Sex Books 



her bad habits. When the child was born and her 
husband showed a good deal of indifference to it, 
his threats to leave her caused her more and more 
anxiety. 

Both families resumed their strife over the child. 
Her mother-in-law insisted upon plenty of fresh 
air for the infant and her own mother protested 
that they were freezing it. The patient's mother 
finally assumed complete charge of the child and 
treated it like her own. 

When her husband was away, his mother berated 
her for not travelling with him; her mother ob- 
jected to this because she would neglect the baby 
by going to meet her husband out of town. 

She was made to regard herself as a failure, both 
as a wife and as a mother. Her husband, thor- 
oughly frightened but well-meaning, decided then 
to educate her. For that purpose he gave her an 
absurd book on "sexology" filled with moralizing 
platitudes on masturbation and perversions. The 
only conclusion she drew from reading that drivel 
was that she was a pervert and a degenerate, abso- 
lutely unfit to raise her child, and that her child was 
doomed to become abnormal. 

She had fits of crying and depression and often 
told her family she wished she, her husband and 
baby were dead. She spoke of her husband re- 

[153] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



marrying and asked her sister to take care of the 
baby when she married her husband. She in- 
dulged more and more in masturbation and began 
to speak of it openly. Delusions appeared. She 
thought people sneered at her "as if she was passing 
disgusting odours." She insisted that she was not 
her father's daughter but a prostitute in a house 
kept by her father; she thought she saw a picture 
of herself in tights in the Police Gazette; she was 
afraid medicines might contain poison. Finally 
she drank tincture of iodine in an attempt to kill 
herself and thereupon was taken to a sanatorium. 

In that institution which she, in her delusions, 
considered as a house of prostitution, some stupid 
nurses yielded to the temptation of playing upon 
her sexual fears and told her many weird sadistic 
stories of immorality. Pursued by erotic fancies 
she tried hard to resist her cravings and adopted 
no end of devices to save herself from masturba- 
tion. She experienced a profound sense of her 
sinfulness and her letters to her husband contained 
many references to her worthlessness, to the fact 
that she had ruined her baby, etc. 

She was then removed from the sanatorium to 
St. Elizabeth Hospital. 

Her husband was deeply affected by his wife's 
mental derangement and was conscious of his re- 
[154] 



The Cause of Relapses 



sponsibility for her depression and anxiety. His 
first visits were very cautiously conducted and he 
always sought advice as to what to say to her. She 
reacted in a gratifying way to his kind attitude. 

She gradually accorded Dr. Kempf her confi- 
dence and learned to depend upon him for assur- 
ance and encouragement. She became adjusted 
to a higher level of interest. 

Suddenly, however, she began to regress, revert- 
ing to her prostitution fancies. The cause was 
not far to seek. 

One day her husband, losing his patience, had 
in the course of a visit threatened again to leave 
her if she did not get well. She learnt also that he 
had been drinking. 

Some time afterward she had another regression 
which was traced again to some stupid statements 
made by her husband. Her mother had died and 
willed all her property to the patient's father which 
necessitated the signature of all the heirs, including 
the patient. Her husband had carried the will in 
his pocket for several days trying to decide whether 
or not he would sign it. He brought up the whole 
family conflict again and told the patient that her 
mother must have been insane when she made that 
will. They were together at the patient's dance 
when it occurred and she changed in a few minutes 

[155] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



from a state of hopefulness and promise to one of 
serious confusion and inaccessibility. 

This lasted nearly two weeks and then she be- 
came more cheerful. 

Then the family difficulties were once more de- 
pressed upon her by her husband, sister and father 
and this time she regressed almost completely to 
a prenatal attitude. She was afraid of being 
smothered in boxes, of being passed into the toilet 
with feces, she had all sorts of terrifying hallucina- 
tions. 

Her dreams, however, showed affective trends 
which suggested that a reconstruction was possible. 
She developed more and more interest in her en- 
vironment, her child, her husband. She gathered 
much insight into her condition and could analyse 
her delusions very skilfully. 

About the twenty-third week she had rallied so 
far that a nurse took her out to visit her people. 
Then the old family quarrel about spending money 
flared up again. The patient wished to change the 
arrangement of the furniture and her sister, as 
domineering as ever, prevented her from asserting 
herself even during her brief stay at home. She 
returned to the hospital angry and worried. 

She had too much insight by that time, owing 
to the psychoanalytic treatment she had been un- 
[156] 



Her Re-education 



dergoing, to regress very far. She recovered and 
was finally discharged. 

Two months afterward, a crisis confronted her 
again. She was pregnant and some members of 
her family were urging her to resort to an abortion. 
She managed to assert herself, however, and bore 
the child. 

When she was discharged from the hospital, she 
seemed to be uncomfortable about two things, her 
inability to find a religion which was free from 
dogma and hypocrisy and a feeling that her educa- 
tion was not ample. Kempf gave her a rather in- 
definite reply on the subject of religion but ac- 
corded more serious consideration to her feelings of 
inferiority about her education. 

Her education had been badly supervised and 
her conception of her fitness as a woman was not 
commensurate with the magnificent affections of 
a practical nature which were natural to her. She 
had become more of a woman in her sympathies and 
insight than the average social light. She had 
a keen insight into the affective mechanism of people 
surrounding her. 

In order to free herself from her feeling of in- 
feriority she read, upon Kempf's advice, biog- 
raphies of famous women and gradually came to 
the conclusion that much of her suffering had been 

[157] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



due to her repression of her affections. She de- 
termined to join the movement for woman's eman- 
cipation. 

Her husband had to be educated too. Attentive 
and kind to her, he was still too completely en- 
thralled by his mother-fixation to co-operate with 
Kempf very faithfully. He could not restrain his 
tendency to criticize his wife and to show displeas- 
ure over her diet, her careless way of dressing, etc. 
Kempf told him explicitly that he should not sup- 
press, among other things, her interest in feminism, 
but frankly support it. He agreed to do so but 
was not quite able to keep his word. 

The patient, however, in spite of all the pressure 
which both families tried again to bring to bear 
upon her, asserted herself. 

She met their arguments with the statements that 
she must use her own judgment "because her physi- 
cian had insisted upon it," and that she did not care 
what they had to say. She could not please every- 
body and no matter what happened she knew her 
physician respected her personal integrity and sin- 
cerity. 

The way in which she managed her second preg- 
nancy and the rearrangement of her household were 
very encouraging. The only distressing note was 
a statement she made that if any hopeless family 
[158] 



A Complete Recovery 



estrangement should arise she would kill herself. 

Therein lurked the possibility of a fateful re- 
gression to the lowest possible level, the fatal level, 
for the committing of suicide is a regression to the 
eternal mother, an effort to return to the ancient 
state of intrauterine peace, comfort and depend- 
ence. 

Now, four years after her discharge from the 
hospital, she is in excellent mental condition, work- 
ing out most of her plans to her heart's desire and 
taking good care of her two children. 

Intelligent, sympathetic re-education, reducing 
her feeling of inferiority; the reliance she could 
place in a well known psychiatrist understanding 
her better than any member of her family and 
whose opinions had naturally more weight than 
that of any one else in her environment have en- 
abled her to become herself at last. 

A perusal of this remarkable case furnishes the 
reader with concrete applications of various state- 
ments contained in the chapters on the Love Life 
and the Sexual Enlightenment of Children. 

The puritanical father and mother who in their 
fear of facts allowed their daughters to remain 
in ignorance of the sexual truth until a former in- 
mate of a house of prostitution brought them the 
most spurious and romantic form of enlightenment 

[159] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 






are familiar figures. The baneful influence of a 
prudish father continually throwing obscene sug- 
gestions into the minds of his children by his very 
efforts to instil "modesty" into them is graphically 
illustrated. 

This case also offers us a demonstration of the ef- 
fects which a man's mother-fixation can have upon 
that man's sexual partner, causing her to experi- 
ence a sense of physical inferiority because to his 
complex-beset mind, the mother type only can rep- 
resent feminine attraction and arouse his desire. 

The striking change which the crisis brought 
about in the patient's personality and in her atti- 
tude to life, makes good food for thought. It is 
difficult to avoid the conclusions that after being 
insane and recovering she was better fitted for life, 
and had become a more interesting human type 
than before the onset of her neurosis. 

To one w T ho realizes that recovery from a severe 
neurosis means the acquisition of an enormous 
amount of insight into, not only one's own thinking 
functions and motives, but into the psychology of 
one's associates as well, it will be evident that many 
persons who lived through such a terrible experi- 
ence may have developed a more robust mentality 
than they ever had. 

Unfortunately that view is not held by many peo- 
[160] 



People Who Were Insane 



pie and the individual who was unfortunate enough 
to require treatment in an institution for the insane 
comes back to his former environment bearing an 
undefinable stigma. People are afraid of him and 
expect him to "go crazy" again at some time or 
other. And their fears are, if not justified, at 
least often realized. The insane man who made 
a recovery sometimes becomes insane again because 
he has been discouraged in his fight for reality by 
the very same people who once drove him into in- 
sanity. 

Kempf's patient having it dinned constantly in 
her ears by two absolutely dissimilar groups of 
people that she was crazy finally followed the line 
of least resistance and yielded to their absurd pro- 
nouncement. The pressure of such environmental 
forces together with the fact that the patient was 
actually insane once and may have a few linger- 
ing doubts about his complete recovery, may suc- 
ceed in sending him back to the institution from 
which he was discharged. 

As Kempf writes, "The thoughtless attitude of 
the people is to be changed by educating them to 
have as much confidence in those who have recov- 
ered from mental diseases as they have in those 
who recover from other diseases, in order to help 
the patient to be less fearful of being distrusted 

[161] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



and disrespected. Both sides of this procedure 
have essentially a therapeutic value in that they 
are conducive to an easier and more durable re- 
covery for the patient as well as exerting a human- 
izing influence on the people. Hence the pro- 
cedure should be an important part of the thera- 
peutic method, a permanent, outstanding feature 
of the hospital life of the patient and the means of 
maintaining social contact between the hospital and 
the community." 

Finally the method employed by Kempf in re- 
storing his patient to a normal condition exposes 
the absurdity of herding the insane by the thou- 
sands in institutions where nature is mainly relied 
upon to bring about a cure. Let the average man, 
Kempf writes, imagine what distress he would suf- 
fer and what changes of character he would undergo 
if he were confined indefinitely in a hospital ward, 
his judgment discredited, and forced to associate 
constantly with twenty to fifty other worrying, un- 
happy people, many of whom had lost control of 
themselves and become sexually perverse either 
overtly or in fancy. The universal answer would 
be that the experience would soon become unen- 
durable to the sane man or woman and cause noth- 
ing less than prolonged misery and suffering. 
[162] 



Hospitals Versus Asylums 



The hospital for mental diseases, he concludes, 
should be a first class vocational university for the 
practical re-education and rehabilitation of the 
people who have become abnormal and unable to 
adapt themselves to their social obligations and 
the social laws, due to their incompatible cravings 
and previous unsuitable education and training. 

Such a plan would require for its realization a 
considerable increase in the number of physicians, 
nurses, attendants, and vocational and athletic 
trainers. This would at first appear very expen- 
sive, but, as Kempf remarks, owing to the great re- 
duction in the duration of the average patient's ill- 
ness, and the increase in recoveries, the annual cost 
would be greatly reduced after a few years. 

Eighty per cent, of the mentally diseased, he 
thinks, could be cured if properly treated. This 
applies, of course, to cases in which there is no de- 
struction of nervous tissues. 

Furthermore, the asylum would lose its depress- 
ing, ominous stigma and many patients in the in- 
cipient stage would be influenced to come and seek 
treatment before their condition had become 
chronic or incurable. What with the many who 
would not become insane owing to preventive meas- 
ures, and the many insane who could be helped to 

[163] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



regain their mental balance, the population of in- 
sane asylums would be greatly reduced by adopt- 
ing Kempf's suggestions. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

A complete report of this interesting case will be 
found in the Psychoanalytic Review for January, 1919, 
under the title "The Psychoanalytic Treatment of De- 
mentia Praecox" by Dr. Edward J. Kempf. 

Dr. Kempf's theories are discussed in the last chapter 
of the present book. His ideas on the management of 
hospitals for the insane, which are very progressive, have 
been published under the title "Important Needs of Hos- 
pitals for Mental Disease," New York Medical Journal, 
July 5, 1919. 



[164] 



CHAPTER VI. THE NEUROTIC ASPECTS OF 
WAR 

Civilization eliminates many of nature's waste- 
ful methods and reduces to a minimum the friction 
between human beings. It modifies individual 
habits and transforms them into clan or herd habits, 
later into national habits. It teaches individuals 
a certain measure of solidarity. 

The herd bands together to repel aggressors of 
a different species ; wolves hunt in packs and do not 
attack one another; flocks of migrating birds wait 
till a tired member of the flock is ready to resume 
the voyage. The advantages of solidarity, how- 
ever, are only obscurely realized by the majority 
of animals and when no emergency compels them 
to realize them, we see them often murdering one 
another to secure one favourite female or a larger 
allotment of the available food. 

Man, likewise, seldom adapts himself perma- 
nently to standards which are very superior socially 
to the purely individual standard. His ego, sex 
and safety urges can be repressed for a certain 
length of time, mainly out of necessity, physical or 

[1651 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



social, but they are constantly striving for direct 
or indirect expression, sometimes through chance 
actions, cruel or obscene wit, day and night dreams. 

Not only does civilized community life compel 
a repression of the urges which is contrary to primi- 
tive human nature, but the demands it makes are 
growing by leaps and bounds. Such demands are 
growing faster than men, the world over, can make 
their urge repression really efficient. 

Thus a constantly increasing emotional strain 
is created which manifests itself in abnormal ways 
among the weaker members of the community. 
The robust and well-fed generally manage to re- 
main normal regardless of the physical and mental 
risks they run. The inferior organisms either 
break down under the strain or defy the customs of 
the community and pay the penalty or they seek the 
line of least resistance and submit in appearance. 

The population of the world, for that reason, 
consists of many more simulators than truly 
adapted human beings. Restrictions are burden- 
some to them but they either conceal the fact as a 
matter of policy or in many cases are ashamed of 
their own impatience and do not even confess it to 
themselves. 

In sudden crises, however, all the pent-up urges 
[166] 



Display of Cruelty \ 



are likely to break through with a violence which 
astonishes us. 

In times of war, we cannot help expressing our 
surprise at the amount of savagery and cruelty dis- 
played by the victorious armies, but that surprise 
simply shows our ignorance of the actual state of 
things. It is not, as Freud suggests, that people sink 
very low in war times; they never were as high in 
peace times as we imagined them to be. 

We all spend one-half of our life regressing to 
the archaic, individual, uncivilized level; for as 
soon as we fall asleep, we discard our morality, 
our ethics, and all our repressions even as we cast 
off our clothes, and indulge in a riot of egotistical 
and sexual gratification through our dreams. 

The only thing which generally holds us back in 
our waking time is, either the fear of punishment, 
direct or indirect, the fear of jail or of social ostra- 
cism, or a clear realization of the financial and so- 
cial advantages vouchsafed by apparent conform- 
ism. 

As soon as war is declared, the terrible tension 
is released and most of our animal instincts find 
gratification; that gratification entails no loss of 
caste, prestige or money; on the contrary. In 
war, the whole community regresses to the animal 

[167] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



level and punishes the individual who refuses to 
regress with the herd. 

Every animal is born with a craving for food, 
which very soon evolves into a craving for power, 
power being the shortest road to more plentiful 
and better food secured with the least possible 
amount of exertion. 

Civilized man no longer starts out with a club 
to dispute dangerous beasts of prey or other hunters 
of a different clan their right to hunt, nor does he 
send out his slaves to run down game. He has 
covered the brutality of the quest under civilized 
veneer and manages to give partial satisfaction to 
his archaic instincts in ways which do not inflict 
too much suffering upon his environment. 

War removes the inhibitions introduced by 
modern business methods. Every nation wishes fc) 
conquer some piece of land for reasons which, at 
times, can well masquerade as humanitarian ones, 
as for instance the necessity of freeing some "en- 
slaved" race which we hope to dominate, or in 
order to "open up" markets, or to free men of 
our race who, in a more or less dim past, were 
submitted to forceful annexation by another race, 
etc. 

Whatever the pretence, the result is the same: 
all the individuals of one community are exhilar- 
[168] 



War the Adventure 



ated by the prospect of starting out to plunder the 
neighbour's land. 

As a matter of fact, very few members of the 
herd, not one out of ten thousand, will be bene- 
fited in any way by the foray, and those few, bank- 
ers and traders, never take part in the expedition, 
but the masses of the fighters enjoy the fact that 
they are engaged in an adventurous undertaking 
of a primitive, archaic type, which in ordinary 
times would be highly unethical but which now is 
authorized, financed and idealized by the com- 
munity. 

The civilized nation has regressed to the level of 
the robber herd of the caveman period. We may 
point out that in legends and in the real life of 
backward communities, the successful robber is a 
romantic, privileged character, to whom the usual 
standards do not apply. 

At such times, some members of the community 
regress even lower than the herd level. 

The herd on the war path is hunting for the herd. 
No single member of the herd will profit by the 
conquests achieved, and the sense of herd solidarity 
is not abolished. The profiteer, on the other hand, 
is entirely devoid of that sense. While the herd 
is hunting, he does not hesitate to starve it if he 
can only corner the herd's food supply and then 

[169] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



sell it at the price his power can dictate and thus 
gratify his appetite. 

Profiteering is individualism gone mad. Like 
the herd's craving for blood and spoils, it may as- 
sume a righteous mask: supplies are difficult to se- 
cure "on account of the war," those who protest 
are branded as unpatriotic for they lack the "spirit 
of self-sacrifice," etc. 

Lying and deceit, two neurotic devices of the 
negative life, and universally tabooed in the in- 
dividual's life, become praiseworthy in war times 
and especially indulged in by the men who prepare 
wars, the diplomats. Diplomacy's greatest ac- 
complishment consists in attaining an object with- 
out letting any outsider suspect it and preferably 
convincing outsiders that an entirely different ob- 
ject is being sought. 

The greatest diplomats were those who not only 
had the greatest capacity for deceiving the rulers 
at whose court they were accredited but for cover- 
ing up their traces so carefully that they actually 
gained their confidence. 

In war times, lying about the enemy is not un- 
ethical. It is, on the contrary, highly commend- 
able as it sustains the morale of fighters and civil- 
ians alike. 

Exhibitionism is another deeply ingrained and 
[170] 



The Lure of the Uniform 



infantile craving of all races, made up in equal 
doses of sex and ego. The males of many species 
parade around the females at mating time, trying 
to arouse their sexuality and at the same time prob- 
ably frightening away other males. 

War offers many excellent excuses for a display 
of exhibitionism. 

The warrior is clothed in a uniform which once 
presented a dazzling array of colours and in cer- 
tain cases was enhanced by precious metals, and 
which, drab as it has become today, for reasons 
of safety, is sufficient to place those wearing it on a 
higher plane than the civilian. 

The wearing of a uniform places all soldiers in 
one category in which every individual is supposed 
to be healthy and vigorous and hence fit for pur- 
poses of reproduction. 

The females respond properly and we see thou- 
sands of service clubs in which young women, some 
of them imitating the males and wearing uniforms, 
foster the men's belief that they are privileged 
characters; some of the women belonging to "so- 
ciety" converse or dance with men whom they would 
absolutely ignore if they cast off the distinguishing 
regalia of the fighting male and donned civilian's 
clothes. 

In war times, the desire for promiscuous inter- 

[171] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



course which lurks in every human being can be 
indulged in without calling forth undue criticism. 
The most jealous husbands are compelled to ap- 
prove of their wives' "war activities." 

The war regression is a boon to all the weak 
members of the community who are anxious to 
regress to a childlike level but are compelled by 
economic necessity to remain on the adult level. 
The useless, the shiftless, who for lack of intelli- 
gence or perseverance, never were able to accom- 
plish anything positive, who have been a butt for 
much scorn and contumely, are suddenly enabled 
to play a striking part in their little world by en- 
listing or being drafted. 

Not only are their failures forgotten, but an 
escape from stern reality is vouchsafed them. All 
of life's responsibilities are now shifted to the state. 
The state feeds, clothes and shelters them and as- 
sumes the charge of their dependents. Nothing 
that befalls the enlisted man's family can affect 
him very deeply, for as soon as he joins the colours 
his responsibility ceases. 

As soon as he dons a uniform, the useless and 
shiftless weakling becomes an object of attention 
on the part of women, even as the worthier males. 
That the sexual element plays a greater part in the 
devotion women show to fighters than a spirit of 
[172] 



Sexual License 



self-sacrifice is well proved by the fact that while 
social clubs had more volunteers at their disposal 
than they could possibly employ, the hospitals of 
New York City during the epidemic of influenza 
of 1919 were unable to find nurses. Although by 
that time the war emergency was over one nurse 
in ward Bl at Bellevue Hospital had to take care 
of as many as fifty patients for 12 hours at a time. 

One of the features constantly reported in war 
news are stories of sexual license and violence. 

The sex instinct, submitted to a terrible repres- 
sion in peace times, breaks through when so many 
other inhibitions are removed. In all epochs of 
history the fighting man's morality has been the sub- 
ject of special allowances. In the past, one of 
war's sequels was the seizing of the defeated 
enemy's women by the victorious tribe. Moses 
told his men to keep for themselves all the virgins 
of the Midianite tribe which they had defeated. 
The enemy's wife or sister has never been sacred. 
Training camps and garrison towns have always 
been known as centres of promiscuous sexual in- 
tercourse. 

Another one of the infantile activities which is 
carefully regulated from an early age and whose 
haphazard gratification is severely repressed is the 
anal and vesical activity, the passing of feces and 

[173] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



urine. A regression to such activities in their in- 
fantile form is reported quite frequently in war 
times. The invading soldiers often defile in the 
most nauseating way the quarters which they oc- 
cupy, not respecting even at times religious vessels 
or other paraphernalia of the enemy's cult. 

The necessities of the national defence enable 
any one with a neurotic strain of cruelty to satisfy 
his craving even in his immediate environment, 
without regard for the law of the herd. 

Thousands of people spy on one another, listen 
to conversations in public places and, whenever 
hearing something suspicious, have the offender ar- 
raigned, if not dragged in a spectacular way to the 
police station. 

This is a manifestation of the egotistical nega- 
tivism which, unable to achieve anything, lowers 
other people's level through disparagement and 
destructive hostility. 

War allows us to insult any one we dislike by 
calling him a traitor or a seditious person and de- 
nouncing him to the police authorities. If he is 
higher than we are, we "get even" with him, if he 
is our equal we make him our inferior, if he belongs 
to a lower social rank, we can then express our 
scorn without appearing snobbish. 

Atrocities are being committed in every war b 
[174] 



An Eye for an Eye 



the victorious armies. Whether they assume the 
form of cruel treatment of civilians or consist in 
using trench gas, liquid flame or other means of 
torture, makes very little difference. Every one 
pretends to experience a profound indignation on 
reading about them, but no one ever suggests any- 
thing but reprisals, retaliation. 

In peace times, we do not disembowel Jack the 
Ripper because he resorted to that frightful form 
of violence, we do not burn alive the man who set 
firu to a house. In war the path of regression to 
primitive cruelty is wide open "for the sake of ex- 
ample." 

Primitive savages who wish something, represent 
it dramatically, sprinkling the ground to bring rain 
from the clouds, burning some one in effigy, etc. 

In war times, the population is made to behold 
at every step lurid posters representing the anni- 
hilation of the foe. Rabid statements are made 
vociferously as to what we shall do to the enemy, 
how completely we are going to crush him, to hit 
him so hard that he shall never rise again. In 
o^her words the task which confronts the nation is 
constantly represented as being successfully per- 
formed and brought to a glorious ending. 

There is also in the rage with which the commun- 
y destroys the things symbolical of the enemy a 



[175] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



regression to the period of infamy which Ferenczi 
calls the period of belief in the omnipotence of 
thought and magic gestures. 

By forbidding the display of certain flags, by 
placing a ban on books and publications printed 
in the enemy's language, by interfering with mu- 
sical performances in which an enemy performer 
is taking part or at which the works of an enemy 
would be given, certain neurotics think they can 
destroy the enemy more completely. 

Whatever symbolizes the enemy and makes him 
present symbolically is done away with. Here we 
behold a process akin to the withdrawal from real- 
ity in dementia praecox and to the ostrich's habit 
of burying his head in the sand. 

Such prohibitions show a regression to the belief 
in magic, a decided evasion of reality and a flight 
along the line of least resistance. 

Intolerance is the most marked characteristic 
phenomenon of war times. It also characterizes 
severe cases of neurosis. 

One cannot discuss with a neurotic. The psy- 
chiatrist who tries to bring insight into his patient's 
mind would lose the battle at once if he began by 
telling him that his story is absurd. 

The thing to do is to let the neurotic tell his 
[176] 



Patriots and Traitors 



story in his own way, to throw light gradually on 
the spurious evidence on which he has built it and 
thus to disintegrate it. But the more absurd the 
obsession, the harder the neurotic will fight to 
have his version accepted. The hopelessly insane 
who knows he is a king or god easily resorts to 
violence when some one betrays scepticism. 

The neurotic may obscurely feel that his story is 
wrong and cannot be defended. Hence his im- 
potence is easily enraged and he avoids all discus- 
sions in which he could not hold his own. 

In war times, rabid neurotics who monopolize 
the title of patriot do not allow any one to discuss 
the war or any of its problems. If they were sure 
of their ground they would gladly confute doubters, 
but being thrall to their emotions they have to fol- 
low the line of least resistance. "Only traitors," 
they say quite finally, "discuss the merits of a war 
after war has been started." 

Intolerance is the last refuge of the loser. Hav- 
ing no strong argument wherewith to silence you, 
he hits you on the mouth. 

The consequences of the wholesale regression 
which takes place during war are interesting to ex- 
amine. 

The states engaged in war disregard all the eth- 

[177] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 






ical rules which have established themselves as the 
fundamentals of behaviour in all civilized commun- 
ities. 

They lie, they practise deceit at home and 
abroad, they deprive people of their freedom of 
speech, they sentence dissenters to incredibly long 
jail terms, etc. 

The masses of the population can only reach one 
conclusion: that is that, while ethics, morality and 
honesty are very fine in theory, they are non-ex- 
istent when tried by the reality test. 

Ethics, morality and honesty are valuable when 
no emergency has to be coped with. As soon as 
the great emergency of war arises, however, the 
state sets them aside as useless or detrimental. 

Hence ethics, morality and honesty seem to have 
only a relative value, not an absolute one and the 
danger is that, when the masses instilled with that 
doctrine of relativity want something very badly, 
they may also act as the state acts in emergencies. 

An enormous amount of savagery lingers in peo- 
ple's attitudes following a war. Men of a con- 
servative type who, before a war, would boast of 
their human feelings and deprecate all forms of 
violence, are heard suggesting violence against their 
opponents. "Shoot them at sunrise," "Get the 
rope," "Shoot them first and try them next," are 
[178] 



Neurotic Death Threats 



the favourite expressions of neurotics brutalized by 
the war spirit. 

Their opponents, their enemies are transformed 
through mental juggling into enemies of the coun- 
try, and hence deserving death. This is a typically 
infantile attitude. The child powerless against a 
stronger boy throws in his face a desperate "I wish 
you'd die." Here is again the line of least re- 
sistance. Nothing will save us from our opponent 
except his death. We then make that death a pub- 
lic necessity. 

The politician who goes about the country 
preaching a summary execution for those who dis- 
agree with him, is unknowingly proclaiming their 
absolute superiority and his absolute incapacity to 
fight them fairly in a civilized way. 

The constant charge of intended violence brought 
by certain men against groups they intend to perse- 
cute is, generally speaking, a projection of their 
own murderous cravings upon their intended vic- 
tims. Suspecting a man of violence is the sim- 
plest excuse for submitting him to violence. By 
pretending that we saw a man put his hand to his 
hip pocket we can always plead self-defence when 
we do him to death. 

The description of many raids made upon the 
locals of labour organizations in recent months re- 

[179] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



veals that the leaders of those raids were not bent 
so much on preventing or punishing violence as 
on indulging without danger to themselves in an 
orgy of violence. 

Raiders entering premises ostensibly to seek 
damaging evidence have been known to smash 
everything in the rooms from electric lamps to me- 
chanical pianos and typewriting machines. 

It will be noticed also that all great wars are fol- 
lowed by epidemics. They are generally attri- 
buted to unsanitary conditions induced by the de- 
struction of hygienic appliances, the presence of 
dead bodies, the weakening of the population by 
famine, etc. 

The importance of all these factors could not be 
denied by any rational scientist. Another factor, 
however, should be added to the list. When al- 
most all the forms of approved regression made 
available by the war emergency have been removed, 
when active negativism has become impossible, 
passive negativism enters into play. The neu- 
rotic who could satisfy his ego through exhibition- 
ism and sadism and become by the performance of 
some simple standardized actions a centre of in- 
terest has to find some other means of dominating 
neurotically his environment. 

This is easily done by assuming unconsciously, 
[180] 



The Line of Least Effort 



(not by any means consciously) the symptoms of 
a simple, seasonable disease, whose description is 
to be found in all the papers, and in that way re- 
gress to a helpless level, into a privileged class 
which enjoys every one's sympathy and help, re- 
ceives medical care, is talked about, is never 
touched by suspicion of malingering, owing to the 
prevalence of the disturbance and is, for the time 
being, removed from and protected against reality 
into which it may fall back gradually, 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Freud, S. — "Reflections on War and Death" (Moffat, 
Yard) and White, W. A. — "Thoughts of a Psychiatrist 
on the War and After" (Hoeber) are two small and most 
readable books which show one Austrian and one Ameri- 
can psychiatrist reaching practically the same conclu- 
sions from their observations of the world war. 



[181] 



IV. SLEEP AND DREAMS 



CHAPTER I: SLEEP, SLEEPLESSNESS AND 
NIGHTMARES 

The most common explanation for the fact that 
we go to sleep is that we are tired and need rest. 

A close examination of the organism in its sleep- 
ing condition fails to lend plausibility to that 
theory. 

The heart continues to beat and to send the blood 
stream on its course through the body. The lungs 
continue to gather in oxygen, the liver to accumu- 
late glycogen. The stomach and bowels keep on 
digesting and eliminating, our beard keeps on grow- 
ing, all our glands keep on producing various se- 
cretions. Some, like our sweat glands, are in- 
finitely more active in our sleep than in our wak- 
ing state. Our mind does not rest by any means 
for we probably dream every minute of every night. 

Our vagotonic activities, that is, the autonomic 
nervous activities which upbuild the body and tend 
to perpetuate the race, are infinitely stronger in 
sleep than the sympathicotonic activities which re- 
strain them. 

Our sense organs are as acutely sensitive in sleep 

[185] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



as in the waking state, for the slightest stimulus 
brings about a reaction of some sort, mostly in the 
form of a dream. 

Besides the fact that we do not move our arms 
and legs, or at least move them very little while 
asleep, it is rather difficult to mention any part of 
the body which actually "rests" in sleep. 

The explanation that sleep enables us to elim- 
inate from the organism the various fatigue prod- 
ucts is not convincing, for inactivity not accom- 
panied by unconsciousness would enable the blood 
to carry off those products as completely as in- 
activity does when accompanied by unconscious- 
ness. 

The same answer could be given to those who 
claim that in sleep we store up again the substances 
(for instance sugar) which waking activity has 
spent lavishly. 

It is not clear why unconsciousness would help 
that process. 

What is it, then, which a conscious state does 
not give us and which we only find in unconscious- 
ness? 

Only by studying dreams will we find a satisfac- 
tory answer to that question. 

Dreams secure gratification for thousands of ex- 
pressed or repressed desires ; dreams find solutions, 
[186] 



Dream Symbols 



some of them absurd, some of them acceptable, to 
problems which have puzzled us in our waking 
hours ; dreams, even though they seem frightening, 
painful or humiliating, always fulfil some con- 
scious or unconscious wish. The process is very 
obvious in gross sexual dreams, less obvious in 
dreams which cloak themselves with complicated 
symbolism, and not at all obvious in nightmares. 

When dreams transform the dreamer into an ir- 
resistible Don Juan or a millionaire, he is quite 
willing to accept the theory of wish fulfilment. 
When a young girl dreams that she is pursued or 
bitten by a dog she may feel rather sceptical as to 
the universal application of that theory. 

Most of our dreams, however, are symbolical, 
that is, they say what they have to say in a lan- 
guage which we ourselves do not understand, para- 
doxical as it may seem. 

We throw shoes and rice at newlyweds without 
actually understanding the meaning of that act. 
Yet we are expressing in that symbolical way a 
wish which is quite appropriate to the occasion, 
and which we would not dare to express in any 
other way. 

Shoes are a symbol of the female genitals, rice 
the symbol of the male fecundating element. 
Shoes and rice have that meaning not only in more 

[187] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



or less fantastic and in accurate dream books but 
in all the folklore of all races (rice being in cer- 
tain cases replaced by wheat or other local cereal). 

Thus we express symbolically the wish that the 
newly married pair may be prolific, a wish which 
the delicacy or hypocrisy of our modern civiliza- 
tion would not enable us to formulate too directly. 

And curiously enough the symbol which uncon- 
sciously we understand quite well, has been in- 
vested by many with a different conscious meaning. 
Many people whom I asked for their interpreta- 
tion of that custom answered, "Well, I suppose it 
is meant to say: 'May the young couple always 
have enough to eat and shoes to wear. 9 ' 

The orange blossoms which crown brides were 
originally an allusion to the great fertility of the 
orange tree which bears fruit twice a year. The 
shyness which the modern mind shows in the pres- 
ence of "brutal" sexual facts has gradually placed 
the stress on the colour of those blossoms and has 
caused them to symbolize maidenly purity, which 
after all is only another sexual fact. 

In both cases, the repression of sexual instincts 
by the growing complexity of community life has 
managed to add a conscious meaning to a ritual 
which has an entirely different unconscious mean- 
ing. 
[188] 



Anxiety Dreams 



But it is the unconscious meaning which symbols 
retain in our dream life, for then the repression is 
infinitely less powerful. 

Dreams aim at giving us absolute freedom of 
action and expression but they do not always suc- 
ceed completely in spite of the symbolical mask 
which they assume in so many cases. 

Life's repressions may be so severe that even in 
sleep the pent-up urges encounter obstacles to their 
gratification. The result is anxiety dreams, popu- 
larly known as nightmares, which are at times the 
source of a great deal of suffering, until the subject 
understands their symbolic meaning. 

The woman pursued in her dreams by snakes, 
or trampled upon by horses, or bitten by dogs, etc., 
is one suffering from lack of sexual gratification 
and attaining that satisfaction in her sleep in sym- 
bolical ways. A subject obsessed by suicidal ideas 
but who did not wish to leave his family unprovided 
for, owing to the suicide clause in his insurance 
policy, would dream night after night that he was 
put to death for some crime, thus accomplishing 
his object without causing his dependents any 
financial loss. 

While dreams of being trampled down by ani- 
mals or being put to death are not to be considered 
at first glance as constituting the fulfilment of 

[189] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



wishes, the first anxiety dream is clearly a symbolic 
form of wish fulfilment, the second, when inter- 
preted with the help of the subject, appears a simple 
solution of a problem which at one time agitated 
the subject's mind and hence is also a wish fulfil- 
ment. 

The function of sleep, then, is to compensate us 
for all the things we must forego in our waking 
life, for all the desires we must repress in order 
to conform to civilized standards. Sleep is a 
means of escape from reality and from the 
monotony of existence. 

The more complex civilization becomes the more 
necessary sleep becomes and the more frequent are 
mental disturbances due to lack of sleep. At the 
same time, it must be noticed that certain people 
whose lives are extremely strenuous do not require 
as much sleep as others do who lead a much more 
peaceful existence. Napoleon hardly ever slept 
more than four hours before he reached the Island 
of Saint Helena. He then slept much longer. Edi- 
son does not require more sleep than Napoleon. 
Many other famous men managed to live a healthy 
life while taking very little rest. 

But those men also led a life in which they ful- 
filled almost all their wishes. Their work was not 
drudgery. Napoleon's life was a continuous 
[190] 



Sleepy Little Towns 



romance of the most exciting sort. Edison's in- 
ventive genius vouchsafes his ego innumerable 
forms of satisfaction. 

The Napoleon type and the Edison type are at 
the opposite poles, the first being highly negative, 
self-centred and destructive, the other highly posi- 
tive, socially useful and constructive, and yet both 
types lived their dreams in their waking hours. 

The drudges, on the other hand, only realize 
their desires in their sleep and hence need more 
sleep. Every one knows how sleepy small towns 
and their inhabitants always appear. People in 
country towns sleep more than dwellers in large 
cities although the latter lead a much more active 
life and hence should require a longer period of 
rest. 

Large cities with their varied life, their exciting 
bustle, their noise, their accidents, etc., make life, 
even for the very poor, the overworked and the 
stupid, a more stimulating set of experiences than 
the well regulated existence one must lead in a 
small, settled and uninteresting village. 

Monotony seems to be after &11 the direct cause 
of sleep. One falls asleep while witnessing a 
monotonous play, while listening to monotonous 
music or a monotonous sermon. While noises are 
supposed to prevent us from sleeping, a very mo- 

[191] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



notorious noise like the tic tac of a metronome or 
the rumble of a train, can induce very profound 
and "restful 9 ' sleep. In fact a subject who has 
fallen asleep while concentrating on the beat of a 
metronome is likely to wake up suddenly when the 
instrument is stopped. I sleep w T ell in Pullman 
cars but I invariably wake up when the train stops 
at a station, although the whispered conversation of 
other travellers entering the sleeping car and their 
footsteps muffled by heavy matting are incompar- 
ably less noisy than the thundering of a speeding 
train. 

Likewise drunken stupor overtakes the weak and 
inactive sooner than the strong and active who pro- 
ceed to satisfy their cravings in their waking state 
and grow jovial or coarse, if not violent. 

Sensitive, dissatisfied people never seem to have 
enough sleep and escape reality in their waking 
hours through day dreams which are very similar 
in every respect to night dreams and during which 
the subject's anaesthesia is almost as complete as 
in sleep, the subject being indifferent to many 
sounds or light stimuli, being as we say, "absent- 
minded," in a sort of hypnoidal state which does 
not strike observers as sleep because his eyes re- 
main open. 

If we sleep mostly at night it is precisely because 
[192] 



Animals Dream 



night, on account of the lack of colour, which makes 
the world more uniform, and the lack of light, which 
makes motions slow r er and more difficult, creates 
the very monotony which induces sleep. 

Many experiments have been made on dogs, 
proving that as soon as their eyes have been closed 
painlessly, their ears plugged and their legs 
wrapped in soft rags, the animals fall asleep and 
remain asleep until exterior stimuli are once more 
allowed to strike their senses and supply them with 
the "entertainment" which they probably seek in 
sleep. For animals dream, as any one who has 
watched hunting dogs asleep can testify. 

That fatigue should enable us to sleep is not an 
argument in favour of the rest theory but is due 
to the fact that after over-exercise, our preceptions 
are not as keen as they were and life is perceived 
more dully and appears more monotonous. Hence 
the escape from it through dreams. 

The theory of rest through unconsciousness is 
exploded by the fact that when overtired we can- 
not sleep. The reason is not far to seek. 

When the organism reaches the point of exhaus- 
tion, the phenomenon of the second wind takes 
place. An excessive amount of glycogen comes 
out of the liver, filling all the muscles with new 
energy, much as a motorist piloting a weak engine 

[193] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



iip a hill would "step on the gas," and adrenin 
creates a tension which seems to make tall our sense 
perceptions infinitely keener (hence the irritability 
of the very tired person, contrasting strongly with 
the apathy of the moderately fatigued individual) . 

In over-exertion the mind becomes unusually 
alert and often obsessed by one apparently impor- 
tant idea. Hence the lack of monotony and stimu- 
lation which otherwise would induce sleep. 

Fatigue, we say, is conducive to sleep, but in cer- 
tain respects, fatigue is sleep. For fatigue in its 
turn is easily induced by very monotonous tasks. 
The limit of exhaustion is reached more slowly if 
at all when the occupations are varied and work is 
performed in a constantly changed environment. 

Fatigue is often produced without any physical 
or mental exertion by a monotonous stimulus. We 
hear very often people complaining that some one's 
droning voice "tired them out." Every one of us 
has had the experience of feeling an uncontrollable 
desire for sleep when in the company of some ex- 
tremely dull person whose personality and intelli- 
gence radiate absolutely no stimulation. 

This view of sleep may throw a little light on the 
nature and causes of sleeplessness. 

Sleeplessness may have physical causes. Over- 
indulgence in coffee, tea or cocoa creates a state of 
[194] 



Common Sense and Sleep 



anxiety which is not favourable to sound sleep as 
it makes one more sensitive to stimuli, causes one 
for instance "to jump" at slight noises and other 
unexpected happenings. 

Lack of physical exercise leaves the body 
stocked up with energy-producing fuel which we 
may finally eliminate by tossing about in our bed 
more or less angrily (anger, by the way, is a good 
fuel-producing factor leading to more sleepless- 
ness). 

Drinking too much water before retiring may 
compel us to arise several times to urinate. Par- 
taking of laxative fruit or drugs may initiate ab- 
dominal activity likely to wake us up, even if no 
movement is induced. 

Overeating and hunger alike create great dis- 
comfort unfavourable to peaceful sleep. Heat 
and cold also can keep one awake. People suffer- 
ing from cold feet should use a bed warmer; people 
perspiring freely will perspire even more freely 
at night and hence should avoid piling up too 
many blankets on their beds. 

In most households beds face a window, which 
enables the first rays of light to awake the sleeper. 
Too many husbands and wives share the same bed, 
thereby disturbing each other's sleep by tossing 
about or snoring. 

[195] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



All the physical causes should be removed first 
and can easily be removed when one is troubled 
with sleeplessness. 

Of the so-called mental causes, worry is the most 
common and the most distressing. It is perfectly 
absurd to advise a patient not to worry. When 
some person dear to us is in danger of death, when 
one is threatened with a catastrophe of some kind, 
when some terrible responsibility has to be borne 
and some weighty problem involving one's future 
or reputation has to be solved, such advice should 
be, and generally is, resented. Sleeplessness in 
such cases is unavoidable but should not be taken 
tragically, the less so as it is hardly ever unbroken 
by "cat naps" or spells of almost complete uncon- 
sciousness. 

People exaggerate greatly their sleeplessness. 
Experiments made at a Western University when 
several men were kept forcibly awake for 90 hours 
showed that on several occasions, when the sub- 
jects imagined themselves awake, they had been 
actually dozing with their eyes open. Their in- 
ability to notice certain stimuli showed that for 
varying periods of time they had not been awake, 
although they remained in a sitting or standing 
position. On several occasions too, their answers 
to questions showed that they had been dreaming. 
[196] 



Anger the Sleep Destroyer 



Old people, in particular, tell very unreliable 
stories about their inability to sleep. As a matter 
of fact old people whose vagotonic activities are 
at a very low ebb, need little dream-producing 
sleep. 

Repressed and ungratified desires do not tor- 
ture the old as they do the young. 

Resenting or fearing sleeplessness are undoubt- 
edly the most insidious ways of inducing or pro- 
longing it. As I mentioned before, anger creates 
a nervous tension and causes the release of energy 
producing secretions, and so does fear, although 
to a different degree. 

The person who works himself up into a rage be- 
cause he cannot sleep, and he who retires with his 
mind full of fear at the possibility of a sleepless 
night are not likely to "rest" peacefully. 

An obsession is easily created: "I am losing 
my sleep," and it can be used neurotically in an 
unconscious attempt at obtaining sympathy and 
shirking some of life's duties. After which, it 
establishes itself as one of the expedients of the 
negative life. 

Some subjects are unable to sleep on account of 
their fear of nightmares. This amounts to a stub- 
born unconscious resistance against some craving 
which expresses itself symbolically through an 

[197] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



anxiety dream. Some of the symbolic dreams I 
mentioned at the beginning of this chapter will 
help the reader to understand what I mean. A very 
puritanical woman might well remain awake to 
avoid an anxiety dream satisfying her sexual crav- 
ings in a symbolical and apparently painful way. 

It is evident that when no physical cause can be 
discovered which would induce sleeplessness, and 
when no definite worry is keeping the mind (and 
the liver and adrenals) in a state of activity, there 
is some recurring dream, forgotten night after night, 
which the sleepless one is trying to avoid be- 
cause it expresses some craving subjected to a 
strong repression. 

In both cases, analysis is the only possible means 
of dealing with the difficulty. The harrowing 
anxiety dream must be interpreted and the craving 
it satisfies abnormally, made clear to the sufferer. 

In the second case, the unknown complex must 
be unearthed and the unknown dream traced 
through day dreams induced in the analyst's office. 

Insight into nightmares is easily acquired which 
soon divests them of their symbolic mask and trans- 
forms them into simpler and grosser wish-fulfilment 
dreams devoid of any anxiety element. A con- 
scious search for the "unknown nightmare" starts 
an unconscious activity which breaks down the re- 
[198] 



Various Suggestions 



sistance owing to which it is constantly forgotten; 
after which it can be disintegrated or translated into 
its actual meaning. 

Thousands of recipes for curing sleeplessness 
have been offered to sufferers, most of them in- 
efficient when not dangerous. 

It goes without saying that avoiding all the phys- 
ical causes of sleeplessness which I listed above 
should be the first step in any common-sense treat- 
ment of that disturbance. But that alone cannot 
be relied upon to effect a cure when some complex 
is responsible for the insomnia. 

We have all met healthy individuals who man- 
age to sleep like logs in spite of having committed 
all the possible dietetic indiscretions and of lead- 
ing the most unreasonable existence. Those are 
not troubled by any conscious factors. 

Staring at, or listening to, a monotonous stimulus 
may help in many cases. Prayer, recommended 
by Dr. Thomas Hyslop, by William James and by 
Dr. Richard C. Cabot, can be considered as such 
a stimulus; when repeated many times, without 
emotion and with the automatism which character- 
izes the delivery of pieces learnt early in childhood, 
it naturally creates the monotony from which we 
strive to escape through sleep. 

Under no circumstances should narcotics be 

[199] 



Psychoanalysis und Behaviour 






used. They do not produce sleep but a form of 
unconsciousness akin to death. They are merely 
poisons taken in too slight a dose to kill us. 

Sleep induced by narcotics may not be accom- 
panied by any dreams and is therefore useless. 
Users of narcotics often complain of terrible night- 
mares. Such nightmares may not be the gratify- 
ing wish-fulfilment dreams which alone make sleep 
valuable and refreshing. 

Sleep should be a display of vagotonic activity 
in an obvious or symbolic form. Narcotics creat- 
ing a deep disturbance of the normal life functions, 
probably occasion in the organism a terrific strug- 
gle accompanied by intense organic fear which can- 
not be beneficial. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

The most useful book to consult on the subject is A. 
Bruce 's "Sleep and Sleeplessness" (Little, Brown) which 
epitomises within two hundred pages all the theories of 
sleep from that of W. H. Hammond to the more recent 
observations of Marie de Manaceine. 

Freud's theory of dreams must be studied with great 
care, as his large book, "The Interpretation of Dreams," 
(Macmillan) is not by any means easy to understand at 
first reading. It might be well for beginners to read 
first Freud's abbreviated edition of it which is now out 
of print but can be found in every library. 

[200] 



CHAPTER II. SELF-KNOWLEDGE THROUGH 
DREAM STUDY 

Dream study enables us to unravel the mystery 
of sleep. We sleep that we may dream and, while 
dreaming, gratify the many cravings which in our 
waking hours must remain unsatisfied if not se- 
verely repressed. Dream study will likewise prove 
helpful in acquiring that most elusive form of 
knowledge, knowledge of ourselves. 

It is comparatively easy to know others. Our un- 
conscious imitation of their attitudes when we ob- 
serve them makes us experience in an obscure way 
the mental and chemical processes of which those at- 
titudes are surface manifestations. 

Only in very few cases are the conclusions we 
draw from our observations of others or which we 
derive from our unconscious imitation of them, 
biased by friendship or hostility. In the majority 
of cases we are probably impartial judges, as im- 
partial at least as our complexes allow us to be. 

How difficult it is for us, on the other hand, to 
judge ourselves. 

We may stand before a mirror and try to ob- 

[201] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



serve our own attitudes, but as soon as we see our 
reflection, we involuntarily modify our pose and 
facial expression and assume others more in har- 
mony with our idealized conception of ourselves. 
We make infinite allowances for our shortcomings, 
mental and physical. We refuse to see ourselves 
as others would see us. 

That refusal is simply one of the protective meas- 
ures life has forced upon us, one of the repressions 
which in certain cases create bad complexes. The 
object and subject are too close to each other. 

On many occasions we suspect that our uncon- 
scious may be thwarting our views of others and 
we may make an effort at being fair. But we are 
seldom in doubt as to our opinion of ourselves. 
And yet how many times do we surprise or grieve 
ourselves by behaviour for which we can not ac- 
count satisfactorily. 

Some unconscious factor forces our hand at 
times, we lose control of ourselves, we begin some- 
thing and suddenly abandon it, we break our prom- 
ises and suffer remorse and refer to the situation 
by saying: I don't know what made me do that. 

Knowledge of our autonomic tendencies throws 
light upon the general direction of our unconscious 
activities, but the information thus gathered is not 
[202] 



How to Remember Dreams 



sufficient to enable us to devise plans for construc- 
tive behaviour. 

While the Aschner test merely warns us against 
overdetermination by "nervous" factors, dreams 
will furnish us with particulars of our unconscious 
cravings and reveal them to us one after another. 

The thing to do then is to collect our night 
dreams and study them carefully, translating into 
understandable stories the symbolic pictures which 
often disguise our night thinking. 

But a serious problem has to be solved first: 
many people forget their dreams completely and 
boldly assert that they never dream. All of us 
dream all night long at a terrific speed. Wake up 
at any time during the night the most "dreamless" 
sleeper and he will awaken out of a dream. Wake 
him up by means of some painful stimulus, like 
a pin prick, and he will tell an extremely long 
story built around that pin prick in perhaps a 
couple of seconds. 

How shall we then remember some of those num- 
berless dreams? 

We must first of all "wish" to remember them. 
Every wish influences our dreams to a certain ex- 
tent. Such a wish formulated by an ailing person 
preoccupied with his health is likely to be a strong 

[203] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



one and will be more or less completely gratified 
in his sleep. 

This statement will be met with incredulity by 
many laymen who have not made the attempt. 
Subject after subject, however, who concentrates on 
that wish at the time of retiring reports the same ex- 
perience in almost the same words: I had many 
dreams that night and during those dreams I was 
repeating to myself: this is something I must re- 
member so as to tell my analyst. 

The first attempts are not all successful. Many 
subjects simply become conscious of the fact that 
they dream but remember only scraps of dreams. 

Those scraps, however, are valuable and will 
help in many cases to reconstruct the missing parts 
of the story. 

It may happen also that the subject has, when 
awaking, a clear memory of several of the night's 
dreams but proceeds to forget them by the time 
his eyes are fully open and he is again conscious 
of his surroundings. 

A simple expedient can be used then which will 
be found very effective. Set the alarm clock an 
hour ahead of the time at which you usually 
awaken. Have a pad and pencil ready near your 
bed and when the alarm rings begin to jot down 
[204] 



The Study of Discrepancies 



without arising your dreams, which will then be 
very fresh and graphic. 

Any one, concentrating on dreams before retiring 
and awaking himself suddenly in the early morn- 
ing by means of an alarm clock, should within a 
week train himself to remember very clearly at 
least one of each night's dreams. 

Dreams must be transcribed at once. Our un- 
conscious is both anxious to express itself and 
afraid of being detected. By five o'clock in the 
afternoon, the dreams which were so vivid to us on 
awaking have either dissipated or been "edited." 
If you write down your dreams in the morning 
and try to write them down again from memory 
at night, the discrepancies between the two versions 
will prove amusing if not distressing. 

Those discrepancies should be the first point on 
which your investigation should bear. "I Was 
walking in the woods with a blonde woman," a 
patient wrote in his note book immediately on 
awakening. "I was walking in the woods with 
some people," he wrote the same night, when re- 
writing the same dream in accordance with my in- 
structions. 

In the course of the day his unconscious had 
attempted to blur the memory of a woman who 

[205] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



played in his life a part more important than he 
was willing to confess even to himself. 

The next step in the study of a dream is to take 
every word of it and to determine its associations. 
Close your eyes and think of the word or sentence 
and let your mind use it as a starting point for some 
short "day dream." Note down whatever ideas are 
brought forth by that word or sentence, without 
exercising any critical censorship over the results. 
The associations may be silly, shameful or merely 
unpleasant. Honesty in recording them will be, 
not only a scientific way of collecting material, but 
a beginning in the training to face facts which every 
normal or abnormal person, especially the latter, 
must undergo in order to acquire insight. 

Read over the list of associations brought forth 
by all the words or ideas of the dream until they 
begin to tell you a story. 

Do not, however, expect the first dream or the 
first ten or twenty dreams to tell you all you wish 
to know. 

This work, slow and tedious, must be kept up 
day after day, week after week, until you are able 
to classify your dreams and the various pictures 
which they present. 

Certain dreams will reappear frequently, certain 
characters will take part in every action presented 
[206] 



Emotion in Dreams 



on the dream stage, certain details of scenery will 
recur night after night, and so will certain situa- 
tions, emotions, etc. 

According to whether the majority of dreams 
refer to the past, the present or the future they may 
reveal a regressive, a static or a positive tendency. 
A neurotic has a tendency to regress to an easier, 
more protected form of life, symbolized by his 
childhood. When acquiring insight and improv- 
ing, he will, in all likelihood, formulate solutions 
for the problems of the present day in terms of 
the present day. After recovering he will, in his 
dreams as in his waking hours, make plans for the 
future. 

It will be found that the "purely obvious" dreams 
are very scarce and that even those lend them- 
selves to a symbolic interpretation. 

The emotional nature of a dream is not a safe 
guide as to its actual importance. A woman 
patient dreamt that she was seated in the balcony 
of an Episcopal church. A man she loved was 
seated with his wife in one of the pews and looked 
bored. 

The woman was a Christian, the man a Jew 
and she was extremely jealous of his attentions 
to his wife. The egotistical desire for domination 
was strong in her. 

[207] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



The dream, apparently indifferent and unemo- 
tional, gratified all her cravings in the following 
way: 

She was seated in the balcony above her lover 
and his wife. 

They had come to attend the services in her 
church; that is, they had adopted her point of view. 

He looked bored, hence was not enjoying his 
wifes company. 

The character of the building precluded between 
man and wife any of the intimacies to which my 
patient objected so strongly. 

Even as the patient remained unmoved through 
the dream owing to her inability to understand its 
meaning or her unconscious resistance to accepting 
its meaning, others will be extremely agitated by 
emotion connected with a dream whose horror is 
not real but only symbolical. 

Nightmares, as I stated in the preceding chapter, 
often melodramatize very simple actions the desire 
for which we have so repressed that they only break 
through the repression after an intense struggle. 
The struggle translates itself into a feeling of hor- 
ror which is in no way justified or reasonable. 

It may be stated that no nightmare has a purely 
physical cause, such as overeating, bodily discom- 
fort, etc. Thousands of people sleep peacefully 
[208] 



Useful Nightmares 



after a heavy dinner or in spite of great suffer- 
ing. 

There are many convenience nightmares which 
endeavour to interpret physical stimuli in a plaus- 
ible way so that the sleeper will not awake. They 
spin a story about the pain or discomfort which 
may be felt and explain it away, so to speak. 
Others seem to use the actual pain or discomfort 
as a basis for a horrible presentation which tortures 
the sleeper and often wakes him up. 

Certain nightmares have the value of a warning, 
for instance in cases of incipient disease which has 
escaped observation. Heart, stomach or lung dis- 
turbances may be revealed by dreams in which 
those organs play a prominent part. Silberer 
dreamt several times that a black cat was clawing 
his throat. Soon after, examination of his throat, 
made necessary by a severe cold, brought to view a 
small tumour which necessitated a surgical inter- 
vention. 

But even in such cases, the choice of dramatic 
means employed by the unconscious to visualize 
the cravings depends, not on the nature of the 
physical stimulus, but on the nature of the cravings 
and complexes seeking an outlet. 

In other words, no nightmare should be dis- 
missed as unimportant for it always has a deep 

[209] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



meaning, sometimes a twofold one. It reveals a 
fierce struggle for freedom of something that should 
be set free if possible and in this respect alone is 
worthy of serious consideration. While visualiz- 
ing itself, that struggle may take advantage of some 
physical condition which in certain cases is un- 
known to the sufferer and this, too, has to be at- 
tended to without delay. 

Whenever an organ plays a constant part in night- 
mares, it should be investigated by a physician as 
it may constitute in the organism a point of least 
resistance. 

In certain cases thorough examination may be 
valuable in proving to the subject that certain fears 
of his are ungrounded. A subject bothered by 
many dreams of impotence was examined by a 
specialist and pronounced absolutely normal sexu- 
ally. 

His dreams of impotence which had always been 
connected with great anxiety were soon after re- 
placed by dreams of normal sexual gratification. 

Careful study of a nightmare always causes it 
to disappear or to lose its painful effect. A night- 
mare, as I explained in the preceding chapter, is 
simply a symbolic expression of a wish subjected 
to a strong repression. When we face reality and 
confess to ourselves certain cravings whose exist- 
[210] 



Small Boys in Dreams 



ence we have been trying to deny they no longer 
assume a symbolic mask in our dreams. 

The young woman attacked in dreams by various 
animals and who forces herself to realize that she 
is tortured by sexual desires, will in all likelihood 
dream that her desires are gratified in a normal 
way. The beasts may reappear but her insight will 
remain even in her sleep and she will not experience 
any fear for she will know that "it is only a dream." 

A subject of mine anxious to become a public 
speaker but hampered by various circumstances in 
the realization of his wishes, dreamt night after 
night that he stood on the platform and tried to 
speak but was interrupted by small boys creating 
a disturbance and, at times, drowning his voice 
with their shouts. 

Analysis of that nightmare proved that his perse- 
cutors were conjured up by his unconscious in an 
egotistical effort to explain away certain deficien- 
cies. Small boys appeared again in the subject's 
dreams, but they were no longer hostile factors and 
after a while they disappeared entirely. 

Nightmares may be the precursors of a neurosis. 
Unconscious habits of thought revealed by dreams 
easily come to dominate our waking thought. A 
benign neurosis is after all a dream (wish-fulfil- 
ment) from which we are trying to awaken our- 

[211] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



selves and a pernicious neurosis is a dream from 
which we do not wish to free ourselves. 

Insight into one's mental workings causes them 
without any exception to become more normal. 

When we are fully aware of the childish, regres- 
sive character of some of our dreams, they begin 
to change and to acquire a more positive tenor. A 
change for the better as well as a change for the 
worse always appears in the unconscious before it is 
observable in our conscious states. Even as a 
nightmare may warn the observer of an oncoming 
neurotic attack, a positive dream of peaceful accom- 
plishment generally heralds a return to normality. 

The results of dream study have many applica- 
tions to our conscious waking life. 

Many family conflicts are due to perfectly un- 
conscious father or mother fixations. A neurotic- 
ally inclined boy, overattached to his mother, may 
unconsciously hate his father and unconsciously 
direct all his energies toward defeating all of his 
father's plans. A neurotically inclined girl, over- 
attached to her father, may also hate her mother 
unconsciously and conduct unconsciously a constant 
campaign of disparagement against her mother. 

Dreams will reveal that situation very soon. 
The subject, victim of a fixation, will often dream 
of the favourite parent who appears in complicated 
[212] 






How We Think 



situations, especially in nightmares, to solve all 
difficulties. The hated parent will either never 
appear or be placed in a situation of inferiority. 
One subject with a father fixation saw her mother 
in a dream as a drunken beggar. One man with a 
mother fixation saw his father driving his automo- 
bile from a back seat while he sat in the front seat 
and gave his father directions. 

Warned by their dreams of such absurd situa- 
tions of which they are not conscious, students of 
dreams can revise their attitudes to members of 
the family circle. Knowing that certain complexes 
of a childish character are prejudicing them against 
some one they can effect a readjustment in their re- 
lation to that person. 

Dreams not only tell us what we unconsciously 
think but how we think. The more normal and 
independent we are, the more obvious our forms 
of wish-fulfilment are likely to be. Complicated, 
symbolic dreams should therefore be characteristic 
of repressed, pent up personalities. 

The man with a mother fixation who simply relies 
upon his mother in dream emergencies is undoubt- 
edly of a less assertive and less carnal type than 
the one who has the typical Oedipus dream of incest 
with his mother. The man who either kills his 
father or attends his father's funeral in a dream 

[213] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



is very different in his make up from the man who 
places him in the back seat of an automobile and 
orders him about. 

Also a knowledge, however superficial, of the 
most common dream symbols may prevent us from 
worrying about certain dreams of a primitive and 
childish type, such as the Oedipus dreams. 

The man who commits incest or kills his father 
in dream is not by any means abnormal or perverse 
and should not consider himself as such. He is 
simply expressing in a very crude way his affection 
for one parent and his indifference to the other. 

The young mother who dreams of the death of 
her children may be simply hankering for a little 
more freedom from household cares and express- 
ing it in the archaic fashion which our unconscious 
often affects. 

Dream murderers, however, can save themselves 
from further dream guilt by acquiring insight into 
the meaning of their sleeping fancies. 

Our unconscious dominates our thinking by our 
leave only. When we set to work to watch our un- 
conscious it is soon shorn of its harmful power and 
can become a great power for constructive work. 

For almost every one of the cravings revealed 
by dreams there is some form of positive satisfac- 
tion. When we seek that satisfaction normally 
[214] 



Our Responsibility 



our dream work no longer gives it to us in an 
abnormal form. . 

Nietzsche spoke truly when he said that we must 
not seek to dodge the responsibility for our dreams, 
for nothing, he adds, is more completely the work 
of our "mind." 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

A small book by I. Coriat, "The Meaning of Dreams" 
(Little, Brown), will prove of great assistance to begin- 
ners attempting to analyse their own dreams. A list of 
the most important symbols can be found in the chapter 
on "Symbols" of my book on "Psychoanalysis, its His- 
tory, Theory and Practice." 

See also Smith Ely Jelliffe's "The Role of Animals 
in the Unconscious," Psychoanalytic Review, No. 3, 1917. 

A monograph by K. Abraham, "Dreams and Myths," 
published by the Nervous and Mental Disease Pub. Co., 
will reveal to the reader the rather puzzling relations 
which have been discovered between myths and dream 
formations. 



[215] 



V. PROBLEMS OF SEX 



CHAPTER I: THE LOVE LIFE 

It is not love in the sense of an affectionate rela- 
tionship but in the sense of a physical attraction and 
stimulation which shall be discussed in this chapter. 
Affection is a very elastic term, in no way dependent 
upon sexuality. It may exist between master and 
dog; we may become attached to an old house, a 
piece of furniture or a suit of clothes, out of habit; 
for congenial people, we may experience, regard- 
less of their age or sex, a profound feeling in which 
interest, respect and confidence may blend. 

Very different is the attraction which a human 
being may feel for, or exert upon, another human 
being of the opposite sex. I might suggest the 
word erotropism to designate that relation, a word 
coined on the model of heliotropism, the force 
which causes certain animals and plants to turn 
irresistibly toward the sun. 

What causes a male or a female to go forth 
and seek a certain type with which to mate, a type 
which to others might perhaps appear unattractive, 
and to disregard entirely many other individuals 

[219] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



who, to a third person, might seem infinitely more 
desirable? 

Many sentimental explanations have been 
ventured by poets and psychologists, but they are, 
at best, expressions of personal feelings of the most 
deceptive sort. 

Nietzsche, who has written an enormous amount 
of nonsense on the subject of women but who, in 
many respects, came "intuitively" to the same con- 
clusions as the various analysts, wrote in 1878, 
long before Freud began his investigations, this 
Freudian statement: 

"Every one bears within himself an image of 
woman, inherited from his mother; it determines 
his attitude toward women, whether to honour them, 
to despise them or to remain indifferent to them." 

The study of the love life of neurotics has en- 
abled psychoanalysts to give a positive answer often 
formulated in a naive way: What can she see in 
him, what can he see in her? 

The neurotic only accentuates certain general 
human traits and tendencies and he makes them, 
thereby, easier to observe. It is an axiom of 
psychoanalysis that normal people are labouring 
under the same unconscious burdens which crush 
neurotics. Most of us, however, bear the burden 
without a visible strain; most of us, in other words, 
[220] 



The Choice of a Mate 



remain healthy "mentally" as most of us, in spite 
of our indiscretion in matters of diet, of working 
and housing conditions, manage to retain our 
"physical" health. 

The neurosis simply acts as a magnifying glass. 

In the male neurotic, the choice of a mate is 
absolutely conditioned by the mother-image, in the 
female neurotic by the father-image. The neurotic 
who is absolutely unconscious of his mother fixation, 
is likely to develop very little interest in any woman, 
until perhaps his mother dies, when he is likely 
to marry a woman resembling in many respects 
his mother as she was when he acquired his fixa- 
tion, that is between his fifth and his fifteenth 
years. 

If the male neurotic, on the other hand, is partly 
conscious of his fixation, he may in extreme cases 
avoid all women, whom he unconsciously identifies 
with his mother, or in less serious cases, seek a 
woman who in every possible respect is different 
from the mother-image. 

The same applies to female neurotics affected 
by a father fixation. 

The resemblance between the love-object and the 
parent-image is at times complete in every respect. 
It may bear upon one or several physical or mental 
characteristics or emphasize certain complicated 

[221] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



situations. An old maid with a father fixation said 
to me once. "I have never married because I have 
never fallen in love with any man who was not 
married." Her love-object had to have a wife, like 
her father. 

In certain cases the fixation bears rather on atti- 
tudes than on physical traits, for it has been 
observed that the child of a neurotic is likely to 
seek as his or her mate a neurotic in preference to 
a normal person. 

Experimentation with animals has confirmed the 
great importance of the mother image in the selec- 
tion of a mate. 

Passenger pigeons have never been known to 
mate normally with ring doves. But let a ring 
dove hatch the eggs of a passenger pigeon and the 
young male passenger pigeons thus brought to life 
will readily mate with ring doves who represent the 
mother image; not only that, but they will refuse 
to mate with female passenger pigeons to which 
their "heredity" or their "instinct" should draw 
them, but which are too unlike the mother image. 

It is probable that all human beings, like all 
animals brought up under normal conditions, are 
guided in their choice of a mate by the father or 
mother image which has obsessed their conscious- 
ness in childhood. 
[222] 



Love at First Sight 



And this is probably a part of the great secret 
of the permanency of the species. 

This observation enables us to understand the 
statement often made by laymen that propinquity 
is the best preparation for love. People who asso- 
ciate constantly and who are not, like brothers and 
sisters, separated by the incest taboo, may gradually 
discover in each other a likeness to the parent image 
which may be too faint to be noticed at first glance. 
This constitutes a rather good basis for a quiet form 
of married relationship, for the mere fact that the 
mates have shared the same environment predis- 
poses them also to a more congenial relationship. 

Love at first sight, on the other hand, is the result 
of a sudden and striking discovery of the parent 
type by one of the mates or both. This leads easily 
to uncontrollable outbursts of desire and passion 
but more rarely to a peaceful life in common. 

The parent type may be found in a person who 
socially, intellectually and morally is not adapted 
to a certain ideal of family and community life. 
Nature, however, only considers the race and makes 
no preparations for intellectual achievements, be- 
sides striving to produce the best possible organisms 
and nervous systems. 

The failure of many unions due to such outbursts 
is not an argument against their biological value. 

[223] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



Marriage being, not an ideal state, but a com- 
promise between what the human, animal would like 
to do and what it can actually do at the present 
time, in a given state of civilization and culture, has 
to take into account the reactions of the environment 
to any phenomenon taking place in that environ- 
ment. 

Family and community peace are better served 
by a union in which the intellectual agreement will 
be perfect than by one in which the physical adap- 
tation leaves nothing to be desired. Our associates 
do not share our sexual life, but they expect to 
share our social activities, and hence make more 
demands as far as these are concerned. 

It can be easily understood why unions in which 
one of the mates is a neurotic are not likely to prove 
very successful. The normal man is "guided" by 
the mother image in his search for a mate, and he 
realizes that marriage is a compromise. The 
neurotic is absolutely "determined" in his selection 
by an obsessional image and the neurotic tempera- 
ment is essentially averse to compromises. 

The neurotic who has married a woman solely 
because she corresponded to the mother image, is 
likely to annoy her whenever she deviates in her 
speech or conduct from her prototype. 

"Mother would do this thing differently," 
[224] 



Neurotic Jealousy 



"You should see the way mother would manage 
this," etc., and many other nagging phrases make 
up the woof of the neurotic's conversation with his 
wife. 

The wife who has been selected on account of 
her dissimilarity to the neurotic's mother is per- 
haps in a worse plight yet. She will be daily 
taunted for being so different from her husband's 
mother and we have seen how this sort of treatment 
accorded to an unfortunate young woman was one 
of the contributing factors of her severe mental 
upset. 

The desire to dominate one's life partner, a 
typically neurotic and negative trait, is found to 
a certain extent in every normal human being. 
Ardent love is seldom observed unaccompanied by 
an effort to encroach upon the freedom and per- 
sonality of the love object. 

Jealousy is one of the most common manifesta- 
tions of the will-to-power in the love life. In the 
normal man, jealousy is an angry fear of losing 
something which to the human organism is the 
strongest stimulus known. The stronger and the 
more pleasurable the stimulus was the more violent 
jealousy may be. 

In the neurotic type, jealousy contains more 
anger than fear. The neurotic burdened with a 

[225] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



feeling of inferiority resents the fact that one 
human being, heretofore subjected to his will, is 
freeing himself from that bondage and subjecting 
himself to some one else's will. Careful analysis 
of the neurotic's jealousy shows that the painful 
element in that emotion is not so much sex as ego. 
The visualization of the love object in some one 
else's embrace which, to the normal individual is 
the most torturing thought, is in the neurotic's mind 
secondary to the thought of the power which some 
one else will yield upon the love object. 

In fact several forms of pernicious neuroses are 
characterized at their onset by attacks of absolutely 
unjustified jealousy, whose absurd or exaggerated 
form causes the patient to inquire into his own 
sanity. A patient treated by a well known New 
York psychiatrist imagined that his wife was deceiv- 
ing him with a man who entered the house through 
a door which he knew never existed and which was 
suddenly opened in a wall which he knew to be 
absolutely solid. 

Apart from the sexual gratification vouchsafe! 
by love, lovers derive many non-sexual forms o 
comfort from their relationship. 

Some of those verge slightly upon a regressive u 
to a primitive level. Ardent courtship admitting 
no third party is a sort of introversion and wi- - 
[226] 



Baby Talk 



drawal from the world, physically and sentimen- 
tally, into privacy and romance. 

The introversion is quite marked in the conver- 
sations of lovers who derive an immense uncon- 
scious satisfaction from the fact that they them- 
selves are almost the exclusive topic of conversa- 
tion. They never tire of telling each other what 
they think of each other and of themselves and such 
statements encounter little if any opposition. 

The regression appears also in the holding of 
hands, a childlike gesture symbolizing a craving 
for reassurance and safety in the parent's keep, 
andf in the baby talk which is not infrequent among 
lovers. 

Infantile caresses and baby talk are quite sym- 
bolical of a resumption of life with the mother or 
father represented by their image in our love mate, 
of our searching for almost the same comfort we 
derived as infants and children from our parents. 

That apparent regression, however, is neither 
neurotic nor negative. The constant search for 
[precedents to every action is a negative trait and a 
: tractor of stagnation. Constant disregard of prec- 
edents, on the other hand, would be destructive 
«i#nd in the field of science a cause for complete and 
[topeless regression. 

i , | Love, being the origin and source of life and the 

[227] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



moulder of the species, has to be conservative if 
the species is to retain the characters it has acquired 
in the slow course of evolution. 

Another form of pleasure which lovers derive 
from each other's company may be understood when 
we recall the experiments made on fishes. If the 
environment of a living being can exert on that 
living being such a thoroughgoing modification that 
colours or objects seen by the eye can be repro- 
duced on the surface of the body, the sight of a 
loved environment is likely to produce a deep im- 
pression on the lover. 

And we must bear in mind that the discovery 
relative to the influence of vision may be supple- 
mented some day by other observations on the influ- 
ence of our innumerable sense organs, of which 
new ones are constantly being catalogued. 

Herein we may find the explanation of a fact often 
mentioned by laymen, that a man and a woman, 
after years of constant association, may grow to 
look alike; if a fish looking at a pattern on the 
sides or bottom of its aquarium can, after a lapse 
of time, reproduce its environment, look like that 
environment, what difficulty is there in grasping 
the reason why life mates, after looking at each 
other for years, reproduce each other's appearance 
and look alike? 
[228] 



Love and Digestion 



Scientific literature and fiction alike have empha- 
sized the healthy and buoyant look of the happy 
lover; fiction in particular has never tired of depict- 
ing sympathetically the opposite type, the disap- 
pointed lover, pale, feverish, depressed, bereft of 
his appetite and of all ambition. 

Those lists of symptoms are confirmed by a 
glance, even superficial, at a map of the autonomic 
nervous system. 

Happiness in love means the perfect functioning 
of the cranial and sacral divisions of the auto- 
nomic system, which upbuild the individual and 
the race, assure a good digestion, regular metabol- 
ism, calm and powerful heart beats, the normal 
elimination of waste matter. 

Unhappiness in love or sorrow due to the loss 
of the love object means a stoppage or reversion of 
the gastric and intestinal peristalsis, palpitations, 
constipation, etc. 

Study of the autonomic system reveals how 
closely ego, sex and nutrition activities are related 
to one another and it is worth while mentioning 
that the vocabulary of all races reveals that relation- 
ship. 

The girl we love is "sweet," so sweet we could 
"eat her up" and "devour" her with kisses; we are 
"hungry" for her caresses, and confectioners of all 

[229] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



nations have some dainty or other which is called 
"kisses." 

The very gestures of the lover are vaguely 
reminiscent of those made by some marine 
creatures which throw their tentacles around their 
victim and after immobilizing it apply their mouths 
to it and absorb it. 

The part played by the parent image in the 
genesis of love should be recalled when we wish 
to answer the question: why does love die? 

As the love object changes with age, its appear- 
ance may not correspond any longer to the parent 
image which was originally responsible for the 
erotropism culminating in a permanent union. 
The organic "reasons" the love subject had for 
"loving" the love object no longer exist. The 
white haired and stout wife no longer reminds her 
husband's unconscious of his blonde and slender 
mother, nor does the bald and portly husband repre- 
sent any longer to his wife the father image which 
captivated her. 

And in this connection, I would suggest a more 
systematic study of a phenomenon designated as 
fetichism and which in certain cases is the basis 
of a sexual perversion. 

Certain parts of the body wield a stronger physi- 
cal attraction than others on certain individuals. 
[230] 



Fetichism 



They create memory images of such compelling 
power that inanimate objects symbolizing them are 
often cherished greatly by lovers. (A lock of hair 
may bring back the memory of beautiful tresses, 
a glove, that of a loved hand.) 

Every human being is unavoidably attracted by 
some part of the love object's body and that part 
varies with every human being. 

Starting with the theory of parent fixation as a 
basis for attraction we may assume that the part 
or parts constituting the fixation played a special 
role in the life and activities of the present image. 

In its perverse form, fetichism shows the abso- 
lute domination of one part of the body or of its 
symbol, in acute cases being even more potent than 
the part it represents. 

In Mirbeau's novel, "Memoirs of a Chamber- 
maid," we have a pervert, whose sexuality can only 
be aroused by the sight or feel of women's foot- 
wear. The case is taken from real life and is not 
an unusual one. 

All human beings are fetichists to a certain de- 
gree and between Mirbeau's neurotic and the young 
man who gazes fondly at his sweetheart's picture, 
there is a difference of degree, not of kind. 

As a matter of practical conduct it would be most 
useful to determine the amount of fetichism which 

[231] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



enters into the make-up of every case of erotropism. 
If each mate could determine accurately what parts 
of his person determined the erotropism of his 
partner, a conscious effort might be made to retain 
as completely as possible the part made attractive 
by f etichism, and thus to prolong the affective dura- 
tion of the partner's love. 

The discarded love object very unjustly charges 
the lover who has grown indifferent with being 
fickle, changing, faithless. 

The truth is that the victim of that fickleness 
is the one who has changed, who no longer recalls 
to his or her mate's unconscious the parent image, 
and hence cannot any longer determine his or her 
erotropism. 

I might compare the "victim" to a dead battery 
which no longer produces any current. If the 
fickle one fails to receive a "thrill" it is not because 
he is no longer a good conductor but because there 
is no longer any current he could conduct. 

It goes without saying that there are men and 
women of the so-called "indifferent" type, who are 
never aroused very deeply because their autonomic 
system, being perfectly poised, has a tendency to 
re-establish constantly the balance of the secretions 
of the vagus system and those of the sympathetic 
system, together with the emotions and attitudes 
[232] 



The Unfeeling Type 



which correspond to them. That type is eminently 
suited for the life struggle, as it "recovers" quickly, 
never remains long under the sway of any emotion 
and is ready to record new emotions, accurately but 
briefly. Such people do not remain in love very 
long and are likely to be berated soundly for their 
coldness. 

The reproaches addressed to them are both just 
and unjust: they are built organically so as to resist 
a too complete subjugation by any love object and 
their attitude is unconsciously determined. On 
the other hand in the case of a union which should 
be permanent, they could, by using their will power, 
place themselves in mental and physical attitudes 
representing, dramatizing, so to speak, the feelings 
they wish to experience. A good actor, represent- 
ing a certain feeling on the stage, causes the audi- 
ence to experience that feeling for a certain time. 
We can, by acting certain feelings, produce in our- 
selves the secretions which correspond to them. 

Attitudes can be acquired and, in the case of 
marriage relations, when complete submission to 
our unconscious urges is asocial and cruel, a sim- 
ple rule of behaviour can be offered. 

As will power on the other hand is probably the 
resultant effect of a keen awareness of the various 
possible choices and of a perfect understanding of 

[233] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



their consequences, that assumption of a beneficial 
attitude is not within every one's reach. And in 
this case, as in many others, praise or vitupera- 
tion is out of place. 

This must be always remembered when we deal 
for instance with love's perversions. The word 
perversion is generally fraught in the layman's 
mind with loathsome connotations. 

A perversion is, to many, due to "low," "ani- 
mal," "filthy," "criminal" instincts. Perversions 
may be filthy and appear low and animal, but 
there is nothing "criminal" nor "instinctive" about 
them. The pervert certainly does not wish to break 
any law, nor is he impelled by an "instinct." He 
is a pitiable type whose education and training has 
made him the imperfect human specimen he is. 

Psychoanalysts are all agreed on the genesis 
of passive male homosexualism. The passive male 
homosexual is in every case the son of a widow or 
divorced mother, separated from her husband by 
death, desertion or legal proceedings soon after the 
boy's birth. 

The boy, compelled to imitate some one in order 
to have a standard of behaviour, copies his mother's 
attitude of physical indifference to women and 
physical interest in men. 

In every respect but in the anatomical respect 
[234] 



Pigeons and Lovers 



he becomes a woman, and later in life will con- 
ceive of sexual gratification as woman would. Pos- 
session by a man will become his love goal. 

Experiments made on pigeons show that the 
process is the same among those birds. A young 
male pigeon raised among males in the absence of 
any female will, when reaching adulthood, be at- 
tracted by males only whom he will treat at mating 
time as though they were females. A male pigeon 
raised among females only will at mating time play 
the part of a female. 

A pigeon raised in complete isolation from any 
males or females will try to mate with any inani- 
mate object found in his cage, or with the hand of 
the person feeding him, and if placed in a cage 
with a female will pay absolutely no attention to 
her at mating time. 

Here as in the case of passenger pigeons mating 
with ring doves, instinct proves to be at times 
infinitely weaker than training. 

The study and treatment of sexual perversions 
are still in their infancy. Men and women prac- 
tising their perversions are deriving therefrom a 
minimum of gratification which generally saves 
them from a well-marked form of neurosis and 
hence they do not seek the advice of a psychologist. 
Those who repress their desire for abnormal inter- 

[235] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



course and merge into a neurosis are dangerous 
patients to handle, for they suffer from many delu- 
sions of invariably the same content: that is that 
they receive sexual advances from people of their 
own sex. Those delusions are likely to apply to 
the psychiatrist handling their case and unless they 
are confined in an institution, may very easily start 
a train of gossip likely to wreck their adviser's 
reputation. 

The perversions known as sadism and masochism, 
the first being a craving to inflict suffering upon 
human beings, the latter a craving to torture 
ourselves or to suffer pain at the hands of another 
person, may be due in their mild form to the child's 
lack of understanding of the relationship existing 
between, for instance, a strong, athletic father and a 
delicate, slight mother. The playful imitations 
of violence, the playful and contented pretence at 
suffering indulged in by the man and the woman 
when fondling each other in their children's pres- 
ence, may lead one child to commit in reality 
cruelties which his father only shammed, another 
child to seek suffering which his mother seemed 
to feel. 

Acute cases, when a man or a woman experiences 
no sexual gratification unless they can inflict suf- 
fering on their mate or be subjected by their mate 
[236] 



What Is a Pervert? 



to cruel treatment, are justly attributed by Freud to 
the witnessing by young children of their parents' 
embracing, who misunderstanding the nature of the 
act identify themselves either with the apparently 
cruel father or the apparently abused mother. 

Like all other maladjustments, the various mal- 
adjustments of the love life, perverse or not, call, 
not for censure or punishment but for understand- 
ing and psychological treatment. When for in- 
stance the nature of homosexualism, its involuntary 
character and the fact that it is forced on the "per- 
vert" by his wrong training, and not acquired by 
him for purposes of gratification, is better known 
to the general public, psychiatrists and analysts 
jnay be able to effect many cures of that "perver- 
sion" as well as of sadism and masochism. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

The basis for the theories of love advanced by the 
various analysts is Freud's "Three Contributions to the 
Theory of Sex" (Nervous and Mental Disease Pub. Co.) 
in which he discusses infantile sexuality, puberty and 
sexual perversions. His discussion of homosexualism in 
"Leonardo da Vinci" is the least scientific or convincing 
work of his on the subject. Poul Bjerre, the Scandi- 
navian analyst, presents in his "Theory and Practice of 
Psychoanalysis" (Badger), several cases illustrating 
forms of attachment with a morbid complexion. Jacques 

[237] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



Loeb's remarks on Heliotropism in his "Forced Move- 
ments, Tropism and Animal Conduct" will supply the 
reader with several examples of chemical determinism. 
Perversions are discussed fully in S. Ferenczi's "Con- 
tributions to Psychoanalysis." 



[238] 



CHAPTER II: CAN WE SUBLIMATE OUR 
CRAVINGS? 

None of the words created by Freud has lent 
itself to more misinterpretation than the word 
sublimation. Sublimation is an unfortunate ex- 
pression. It is not related in its analytic meaning 
to sublimation as understood by chemists. It be- 
comes involuntarily associated with the adjective 
sublime and this association is the cause of a good 
deal of mischief. 

By sublimation, Freud understands a process 
which seeks to utilize the sexual energy, immobi- 
lized by repressions and set free by analysis, for 
higher purposes of a non-sexual nature. 

This is of course extremely vague and slightly 
fantastic and reminds us of the attempts made by 
alchemists in the middle ages to transmute "base 
metals" into gold. 

We must beware of false analogies: heat can be 
transformed into power, power into heat and both 
into light, which in its turn can be transformed 
into power or heat, but human energy and energy 
as defined by physicists, while probably very simi- 

[239] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



lar, cannot be considered as synonymous and treated 
as such. 

The human body is, as Kempf has said, a bio- 
logical machine, but biological machines and ordi- 
nary machinery present one capital difference. 
While some mechanical apparatus may be so con- 
structed that it can be utilized in ten or twenty dif- 
ferent ways at the same time, the use or non-use 
of one or several of its parts does not affect the 
other parts. In the human organism all the parts 
are closely related and abuse or disuse of one of 
them has a repercussion in all the organs of the 
body. 

A part of a machine may never be used and yet 
remain in perfect condition if protected against 
rust. Any part of the biological machine will 
wither and degenerate unless it is allowed to per- 
form its specific functions. Atrophied muscles and 
ankylosed joints are the result of lack of normal 
activity. 

Cravings, some people will say, are not to be 
compared to the play of muscles or joints. The 
tendency of modern psychology, however, is to 
identify more and more closely cravings with cer- 
tain definite segments of the autonomic nervous 
system, and when that identification has been com- 
pleted it will be obvious that to the atrophy of a 
[240] 



Holy Men and Their Trials 



certain nerve there must correspond the atrophy of 
the craving that nerve carries. 

While sublimation is a ne*w word, attempts at 
sublimation are nothing new. The ascetics who 
scourged their flesh to kill their "animal" desires, 
who withdrew into the desert to shun all tempta- 
tions, were attempting to sublimate their cravings. 

In too many cases, the result was not especially 
gratifying. The repression of a normal craving 
often meant the appearance of an abnormal symp- 
tom. The devil tempted sorely the holy men and 
women who were fighting the flesh, which meant 
that they exchanged normal reality for hallucina- 
tions, normal desires for perverse desires. 

No normal craving can be normally repressed. 
Nor can it be normally sublimated. Sexual desire 
cannot be transformed into artistic achievement, 
philanthropy, social usefulness. 

Sexual desire may be killed by castration, after 
which it may be that more energy can be expended 
by the subject on attaining other goals of a "higher, 
non-sexual character." Even this is rather dubious, 
as sexual activity is always linked and almost 
synonymous with many other organic activities. 

The desirability of sublimation, except as a social 
convenience, remains to be proved. Freud's asser- 
tion that culture owes many of its conquests to the 

[241] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



sublimation of sexual cravings is contradicted by 
the biography of many famous men; let us only 
mention Goethe and Rodin, who displayed a fever- 
ish creative activity while indulging freely and 
openly their sexual desires. Freud attempts to tell 
us that Leonardo da Vinci's creative powers may 
have been enhanced by his lack of desire for 
women's love. But Leonardo was a homosexual 
and satisfied his cravings abnormally, which used 
up at least as much energy as though he had satis- 
fied them normally. 

While guilty of vagueness when propounding his 
theory of sublimation, Freud should not be held 
responsible for some of the vagaries which some of 
his followers and some of the Swiss analysts have 
indulged in regarding the desirability and possi- 
bility of sublimating sexual cravings. 

"We must not forget," Freud said in one of his 
lectures, "that a part of the suppressed sexual crav- 
ings has a right to direct satisfaction and should 
find it in life. Exaggerated sexual repression 
simply hastens our flight from reality and into a 
neurosis without assuring any cultural gain. 

"We must not neglect the animal part of our 
nature. The elasticity of sex may lure some of us I 
to attempt a more and more complete sublimation 
destined to promote high cultural aims. But even 
f242l 



The Education of a Horse 



as our modern machines can only transform a part 
of the heat applied to them into useful mechanical 
work, sublimation can only use for other aims a 
part of the sexual energy. 

"If the repression of sexuality is pushed too 
far it amounts to a robbery committed against the 
organism." 

And he concluded his lecture with a story which 
left no doubt as to his opinion in the matter. 

A village community kept a horse that could do 
an enormous amount of work. The wiseacres of 
the community thought, however, that he consumed 
too much fodder. They decided, therefore, to train 
him to subsist on smaller and smaller rations of 
fodder. The horse was apparently none the worse 
for his scanty diet. He finally was able to subsist 
on one stalk of hay a day. The next day, he was 
to be put to work without any fodder at all. On 
the morning of that day, however, he was found 
dead in his stall. The sublimation of his craving 
for food was complete. 

The constantly increasing repression to which 
sexual cravings are submitted, owing to the grow- 
ing complexity of community life, compel every 
thinking human being to give the subject the earnest 
consideration it deserves. 

A mere denial of the possibility of sublimation 

[243] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



as understood by Freud or a convenient assertion 
of its possibility by well meaning, though irre- 
sponsible moral zealots, will not solve the problem. 

The problem, however, has not been formulated 
properly. 

The question is not as to whether we can subli- 
mate the sexual craving as understood biologically, 
but as to whether we can sublimate the sexual crav- 
ing as complicated by modern civilization. 

Sexual desire at the present day has been com- 
pletely exiled from polite society, from conversa- 
tion, from literature, from pictorial representation, 
and relegated to the bedroom. 

Many of its more or less unavoidable conse- 
quences, love, affection, tenderness, admiration, 
etc., have been given an undue prominence for the 
purpose of drawing a veil over the gross physical 
phenomena of sex. 

As we are too often the victims of the vocabulary 
we use, many rely upon the vocabulary of polite 
society to assist them in their flight from gross 
reality. 

A woman unable to voice publicly her desire 
for sexual gratification declares that she seeks a 
companion. And she probably means that, too. 
And if her lack of gratification should be the cause 
of a neurosis, it would be most important to know 
[244] 



Madame Bovary 



that her sexual craving is complicated by a craving 
for companionship. 

Almost any craving can be easily gratified in our 
modern world so long as it remains dissociated from 
other cravings. The sexual craving being frowned 
upon by our hypocritical civilization, is constantly 
associated with many other cravings which the 
normal man, as well as the neurotic, imagine to be 
inseparable components of "love." 

The love of an individual for an individual of 
the opposite sex may, according to temperaments, 
include one or all of the following cravings : domi- 
nation, companionship, protection, pride, boastful- 
ness, submission, praise, possession of beauty, 
active or passive tenderness, wealth, romance, ex- 
citement. 

While every one of these non-sexual cravings 
may be invoked by men and women to justify sexual 
indiscretions to which their gratification has led, 
it may be also stated that in thousands of cases, the 
sexual gratification was an incident of the gratifica- 
tion of one or several of these cravings. 

Flaubert's silly and touching heroine, Madame 
Bovary, was anything but an oversexed woman car- 
ried away by her sensuality. Love, to her, meant 
romance, sentimental companionship, the transla- 
tion into real life of the fiction and poetry she had 

[245] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



read or memorized, mysterious trysts, perilous situ- 
ations, obstacles successfully surmounted, the 
breaking away from conventionality and monotony, 
an opportunity to give vent to the trashy lyricism 
which filled her day dreams, etc. Those were 
really the things she craved but her lack of intelli- 
gence, of ability in any direction, of psychological 
insight, of altruistic guidance, conspired to convince 
her that in love only could she attain the gratifica- 
tion of all her desires. 

When reality proved cruelly deceptive and she 
saw all her dreams shattered, she fled from reality 
by the path of suicide. 

Others adopt the path of the neurosis, seeking an 
abnormal gratification of a sometimes very painful 
type or imagining that all their wishes have been 
fulfilled and living the unreal life of the insane. 

It goes without saying that even a moderate 
sexuality reinforced and complicated by so many 
sentimental associations becomes a tyrant against 
whose domination the subject's will can hardly pre- 
vail. 

The task of the analyst in such cases is easily 
defined, although difficult of execution, for the truth 
in such matters is not always readily ascertained. 

While a subject may deny vehemently to his asso- 
ciates that he is obsessed by sexual thoughts, he 
[246] 



Parasitic Cravings 



may in the seclusion of a physician's or an analyst's 
office, greatly exaggerate those cravings which he 
aims to make responsible for his condition. 

The analyst must then determine all the parasitic 
elements which have attached themselves to the 
sexual cravings as barnacles attach themselves to 
a ship and endeavour to make the subject see them, 
not as essential details of his obsession, but as 
separate entities. 

Every one of Emma Bovary's cravings could 
have been satisfied separately in non-sexual ways if 
she had not relied upon an ideal lover to bring to 
her all the elements of happiness, if she had entered 
the road of positive personal achievement. 

Likewise many a woman suffering from sick 
headaches because her husband or lover neglects 
her and fails to help her carry out her dreams of 
domination, could be relieved of her symptoms if 
she could be made to see in how many other direc- 
tions her will-to-power could exert itself. 

After positive means have been agreed upon 
between the subject and the analyst for the gratifica- 
tion of the various parasitic cravings which have 
been separated from his sexual craving, there will 
be a residuum of pure sexuality for which no sub- 
limation can be suggested. 

If that craving does not receive satisfaction of 

[247] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



a normal nature it will proceed to satisfy itself in 
more or less abnormal ways, the least abnormal of 
which will be, according to the subject's repres- 
sions, gross sexual dreams or symbolical anxiety 
dreams. Further analysis should endeavour to 
transform such anxiety dreams into obvious dreams 
so as to avoid the organic waste corresponding to 
anxiety. 

No "ethical" solution, however, can be offered 
by any honest analyst for the subject who, owing to 
certain complications of modern life, cannot secure 
normal sexual gratification. 

Religious meditation may satisfy the mystical 
cravings which are often associated with sex- 
ual desire, but it does not satisfy that desire ex- 
cept in abnormal ways, as in the case of Zinzendorf , 
who imagined himself a woman in the arms of the 
Heavenly Bridegroom. 

Charitable or social work of the philanthropic 
type will use up the masochistic love components 
which cause the subject to expend care or tender- 
ness upon others. 

Artistic endeavour would gratify egotistical crav- 
ings, and so would public speaking, acting, and 
other activities more or less exhibitionistic in their 
character. 

Joining clubs, societies, etc. is the best way to 
[248] 



Positive Suggestions 



satisfy the desire for companionship; organizing 
new groups and assuming their leadership would 
relieve the feeling of inferiority which drives one 
to secure some form of domination. 

A thousand other suggestions for craving-grati- 
fication of a positive, socially useful and beneficial 
type can be suggested by the analyst to his subject 
and should be suggested, but I repeat, none of them 
will reduce the power of the sexual craving itself. 

The sexual craving, however, after being freed 
of all parasitical cravings, will appear infinitely 
less insistent. 

A comparison with another physical craving will 
make the point clearer. Certain neurotics are tor- 
tured by a constant need to urinate which may be 
designated as "nervous," for its satisfaction reveals 
that an insignificant amount of urine has accumu- 
lated and that the pressure exerted by it is not suf- 
ficient to demand the voiding of the bladder. 

It is not the quantity of urine present in the blad- 
der, nor the condition of the bladder or of the 
urinary passages which creates the need, but some 
compulsion which uses the urinary organs as a con- 
venient means of self-expression. 

When the obsessive ideas connected with urina- 
tion are removed by analysis, urine can be retained 
in the bladder for several hours without causing any 

[249] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



discomfort. In this case we have a parasitic crav- 
ing attaching itself to a physical function and 
making the performance of that function a con- 
stantly reappearing need. 

Cravings for certain foods disappear, leaving 
simply a healthy appetite for those foods, when 
the associations which make such foods absolutely 
necessary for the subject's peace of mind or hap- 
piness have been made conscious. A patient un- 
able to digest anything but milk and hard brown 
rolls which he carried in his pocket and constantly 
toyed with, began to assimilate easily other ali- 
ments when he realized his regression to an infan- 
tile diet and to a symbolic form of coprophilism. 

His liking for milk and rolls did not pass away 
when he gained insight into the unconscious reasons 
for his abnormal craving for them. He still consid- 
ered them as pleasant forms of nourishment but 
he was no longer obsessed by the thought of them. 

Whether the sexual craving is conscious or un- 
conscious, it should be submitted to a careful analy- 
sis leading to its disintegration into a genuine sexual 
need and various parasitic cravings. 

Finally a word should be said about subjects 
who, owing to certain fears, fear of disease, fear 
of impotence, fear of "injuring their brain," shun 
sexual gratification. 
[250] 



Convenient Excuses 



Their case is generally rather complicated, for 
their fear itself is a neurotic fancy which leads 
them to submit to a deprivation likely, in its turn, to 
cause more neurotic complications. 

After their phobia has been analysed and re- 
moved, they should be enlightened sexually and 
freed from the various superstitious beliefs rela- 
tive to sexual activities which are being spread 
abroad by quacks or ignorant puritans and upon 
which the neurotic imagination seizes as a conven- 
ient excuse for certain forms of negativism. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Very little has been published on the subject of subli- 
mation besides Freud's remarks in his lectures on the 
"Origin and Development of Psychoanalysis," delivered 
at Clark University. 0. Pfister, a lay analyst, of Switzer- 
land, has devoted to it several pages of his book "The 
Psychoanalytic Method" (Moffat, Yard). "Sanity in 
Sex" by W. J. Fielding (Dodd, Mead) will offer valu- 
able suggestions to the student of sex problems. 



[251] 



CHAPTER III. PURITANISM A DIGNIFIED 
NEUROSIS 

Humorists very often express in a few lines what 
long-drawn psychological treatises based on many 
tests and experiments do not always make very 
clear. No better analysis of puritanism could be 
found than that contained in this rather ancient but 
very pointed story: 

A puritanical woman telephoned to the police 
asking that small boys who were bathing naked in 
front of her house be arrested. An officer was sent 
to drive them a mile or so farther down the river. 

A few minutes later she called up again: "I 
can still see them, from the roof of the house." 
Once more a policeman went forth to frighten the 
urchins away. 

Half an hour later, the police station phone rang 
again: "I can still see them/ 9 the puritanical 
woman said, "through my field glasses." 

In other words, a subject, sexually hypersensi- 
tive, discovers a sexual stimulus in an object 
which in a normal subject would not produce any 
stimulation of a sexual type. The subject resents 
[252] 



The Puritan Is Abnormal 



the disturbance thus produced in his sexual life 
and, unable to resist the attraction of the stimulus, 
demands that the stimulus be removed by legal in- 
tervention. 

The records of the New Haven courts dating back 
to the early days of the New England colonies pre- 
sent that picture over and over again. Many are 
the cases in which a whole community spied day 
and night for weeks or months upon some indis- 
crete pair of lovers and, after satisfying its voyeur 
instincts, finally delivered them to justice to be 
whipped for their sins. 

The normal indignation of the witnesses was in- 
extricably mixed with a sense of perverse grati- 
fication and resentment not entirely devoid of 
envy. 

The puritan, taking the word in its modern ac- 
ception, is a sexually abnormal person. Accord- 
ing to whether its abnormality is anaesthesia or 
hyperaesthesia, we have two types, both negative 
socially, one of which, however, is seldom objec- 
tionable. 

The sexually frigid person whose frigidity is 
organic, being due to undeveloped genitals or low 
vitality, cannot understand the influence exerted 
on normal individuals by sexual stimuli. That 
type links sexual activities with urinary or anal 

[253] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



functions and for reasons of delicacy avoids any 
mention of them. 

Such people lead what is generally considered 
as a "pure" life; suggestive literature, theatrical 
performances, pictorial art, etc., do not appeal to 
them, and they are likely to regard any one in- 
dulging in sexual pleasure as "low" or "animal," 

They have their counterpart in every walk of 
life, where we meet people who do not care for 
cabbage, who do not smoke, who do not like to 
climb mountains and never go fishing, but who at 
the same time let others eat cabbage, smoke, climb 
mountains and go fishing. 

The hyperaesthetic puritan, on the other hand, 
is not satisfied with abstaining from cabbage. He 
wishes to suppress cabbage wherever found and 
to jail those selling it and eating it. 

Oversexed neurotics not only are profoundly 
disturbed by sexual thoughts and facts but place 
a sexual complexion on almost everything. 

It was only last summer that a Massachusetts 
woman had her neighbour arrested for allowing 
his two infants to bathe in the sea without bathing 
suits. Every summer the sight of one-piece bath- 
ing suits for men produces a "brainstorm" in some 
oversensitive neurotic and bathers are fined by 
stupid judges. A few months ago a society was 
[254] 



Outlawing the Bible 



formed in New York City to prevent owners of de- 
partment stores from showing "suggestive" lingerie 
in their windows. 

When we remember that ten years ago or so, the 
New York Society for the Suppression of Vice 
raided a perfectly legitimate art school and seized 
a catalogue containing reproductions of nude draw- 
ings made by the pupils of that school, that the same 
society has caused purely medical books to be ex- 
cluded from the mails and is at present trying to 
censor articles appearing in medical publications, 
we must come to the conclusion that "organized 
puritanism" is not a constructive force but a 
neurotic symptom unjustly dignified by the police 
and the courts, a mere form of sexual hyperes- 
thesia. 

Even the sacred books can furnish those neurotics 
with sexual stimulation. George Francis Train 
was jailed in the eighties for publishing the Bible 
serially in the Citizen and thus "debauching the 
young." ... A group of puritans investigated 
Chicago's "vice" a few years ago and drew a sen- 
sational report of their findings. Thereupon an- 
other group of puritans found that report too fas- 
cinating and managed to have it excluded from the 
mails on the ground of obscenity. 

The complexity of modern society makes a great 

[255] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



amount of sexual repression unavoidable and chil- 
dren, for instance, reaching the age of puberty 
must be protected against certain dangers. Sexual 
truths, however, would be a better protection for 
them than sexual lies, and while puritans usually 
harp on the protection needed by immature minds, 
they never make any positive suggestion for mak- 
ing minds n^ore mature. 

The puritan himself is extremely immature and 
romantic. In all puritanical ways of thought-ex- 
pression we find a large measure of sexual romance. 

Scientific terms place upon human intelligence 
limits beyond which it must not go if it wishes to 
remain accurate. The words syphilis and gonor- 
rhea not only present definite clinical pictures but 
strip the diseases they indicate of any romance. 

The puritan, on the other hand, who designates 
them as "social diseases" or "diseases of vice" and 
fails to describe any of their symptoms, makes them 
mysterious and hence to certain minds infinitely 
attractive. 

The word pregnancy is generally heard in re- 
spectful silence. The expression "an interesting 
condition" generally elicits a smile. 

Likewise, the puritan shuns the words brothel, 
prostitute, sex, and prefers the more elastic and 
more suggestive expressions: house of ill fame, 
[256] 



Woman's Immature Mind 



woman of questionable reputation, animal in- 
stincts. 

Not only do we find in the puritan vocabulary 
the vagueness which promotes sexual dreaming but 
we observe also the inaccuracy and displacement 
which are characteristic of the neurotic escape from 
reality. Arms, even bare, are decent, but legs are 
tolerable only when renamed limbs, the belly be- 
comes the stomach and a woman carries her unborn 
child "under her heart." 

The puritan continually indulges in the dispar- 
agement of woman which is one of the most char- 
acteristic neurotic and negativist traits. The fear 
of the sexual partner is intense in the anaesthetic 
and hyperaesthetic alike. The undersexed is made 
through intercourse to realize his inferiority, the 
oversexed is loath to be dominated by his desire. 
Hence both resent woman and her attraction. The 
fear of wom;an, the impure, the temptress, fills the 
literature of puritanism. 

A puritanical judge defined obscenity as "what- 
ever might arouse a libidinous passion in the mind 
of a modest woman." John S. Sumner said of 
Dreiser's "The Genius," that he looked at it "from 
the standpoint of its harmful effects on female read- 
ers of immature minds." 

The Rev. John Roach Straton discussing spiritual- 

[257] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



ism stated that women are the associates of the 
devil, constantly in league with him to lead men 
to perdition and adduced as evidence the fact that 
the majority of mediums are women. 

The puritan is not satisfied with suppressing ob- 
vious "evils"; he must uncover hidden evils and, 
at times, his eagerness to catch sinners gives the 
impression that he is somerwhat of a voyeur. 

Clergymen who could not as such attend "sug- 
gestive" shows, drink in "gin mills," consort with 
cabaret dancers or enter "houses of ill repute," 
can indulge in all those diversions provided they 
assume the character of moral crusaders. 

The next day they gratify their sadism by de- 
nouncing and hauling into court the sinners they 
previously befriended. 

In all sexual relations there is a survival of a 
primitive craving which drives one of the sexual 
partners to overpower the other. In mammals it 
is generally the male who overpowers the female. 
Civilization has repressed that craving in a large 
degree. 

In neurotics, however, a regression takes place 
which enables the male to avenge himself, so to 
speak, upon the female, for her domination, by 
brutalizing her. It generally stops at disparage- 
ment, nagging or hatred, but in certain pervert 
[258] 



The Puritan s Egotism 



cases there is actual violence offered. The sav- 
age persecution of prostitutes by vice-fighters (on 
one occasion driving them out of their houses and 
on the streets, without providing any shelter or 
planning any measures of rescue), points to primi- 
tive, barbaric savagery gratifying itself in a cow- 
ardly, neurotic way. 

I say cowardly because such exhibitions of vio- 
lence are always countenanced by the mob. Mil- 
lions of inferior persons without any ability in any 
direction, lacking in the self-assertion which wealth 
might give them, unable to force their way into 
"exclusive circles," are prone to don the mantle 
of moral righteousness in order to acquire without 
physical or mjental exertion some form of supe- 
riority. 

Neurotic egotism is strong in puritans who are 
not satisfied with saving the world from a thousand 
imaginary dangers but use all the channels of pub- 
licity to proclaim their achievements. 

Many of those traits were exemplified by An- 
thony Comstock's life and activities, as described 
by his official biographer C. G. Trumbull. He 
was the son of a rather brutal father who added to 
his cruelty a decided refinement of the perverse 
sort, sending the lad into the woods to cut the 
switches with which he was to beat him. Little 

[259] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



Anthony was in the habit of nicking those switches 
so that they would break when his torturer applied 
them too energetically. The reasons for those 
beatings are not mentioned but another paragraph 
of the official biography enables us to venture a 
guess. 

"Certain things that were brought into his life 
in those boyhood days started memories and lines 
of temptation that were harder for him to overcome 
than anything that ever came into his life in later 
years." 

"He knows what an awful and lasting poison 
is the poison of impurity. Once gaining entry 
into a life, through book or story or picture, it 
stays. . . . There the images stay to be called up 
freely and used at will by the Devil." 

In other words he probably remained all his life 
the inflammable boy every human being is at the 
time of puberty and having lingered at that child- 
like level, was convinced that all mankind was as 
undeveloped, as easily tortured by temptation as he 
was, and exposed to all the dangers which frighten 
the hypererotic. 

Fanaticism appeared in his behaviour at an early 
age. At eighteen he broke into a saloon and 
spilled all the "liquor" in the place. When he en- 
listed he would not only refuse to drink his ration 
[260] 



Comstock's Delusions 



of whiskey but throw it out on the ground in the 
presence of his fellow soldiers. 

Mustered out from the army he became a dry 
goods clerk in New York City. He seems to have 
suffered at that time from the delusions and hal- 
lucinations which are frequently observed in the 
sexually abnormal who repress their cravings 
through a severe struggle. 

"During those six years of varied business ex- 
perience," his biographer writes, "he had come to 
know young business men, over and over again, 
whose lives were plainly ruined by their interest 
in the obscene pictures and literature and other 
devilish things that they had easy access to. . . . 
In his close contact with the young business men of 
the city, he saw them falling about him almost like 
autumn leaves, withered at the blighting touch of 
the obscenities that were the staple of so much 
commercialized traffic." 

Every analyst has met the syphilophobiac who 
attributes everybody's sickness, misfortune or 
death to venereal disease, or the unconscious homo- 
sexual who in every gesture which another man 
makes, sees an improper advance. 

Comstock's megalomania revealed itself in his 
constant reiteration of his belief that God was guid- 
ing every one of his actions ; he even had auditory 

[261] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



hallucinations in which a voice told him where to 
go to find obscene objects. 

In other words, a pitiable type, fit to be treated 
by psychiatrists and not to be entrusted with the cen- 
sorship of a nation's morals. 

The society he founded displays on every occa- 
sion the neurotic craving for power which only an- 
noys but never helps, which punishes but never 
offers a constructive suggestion for reclaiming cul- 
prits. 

The desire for suprahuman powers, for the ac- 
quisition of a privileged situation in the community 
has always characterized sexual puritanism from 
its beginnings. In ancient religions, men or 
women mentally upset by sexual privation, priests 
and priestesses of various cults, were credited with 
superhuman wisdom and their hysterical ravings 
called oracles. 

Several religions have imposed celibacy upon 
their priests in the belief that such a condition 
would enable them to rise to a higher spiritual 
plane. When certain churches began to lose their 
intellectual leadership they established puritanical 
restrictions in order to conquer some form of moral 
leadership. 

In our days this procedure is very evident in the 
antics of a Billy Sunday or a John Roach Straton 
[262] 



Puritans and Exploiters 



who, lacking totally in any ideas, resort to vitupera- 
tion and lavish anathemas on "sinners." If those 
neurotics could not rise in indignation at the thought 
of the low gowns and silk stockings worn by young 
women they would have to remain silent. 

It goes without saying that the alliance of puri- 
tanism with religion is looked on favourably by 
those who prefer to see the masses interest them- 
selves in a future life. The exploiter of labour 
and the profiteer approve of Christianlike resigna- 
tion and of the acceptance of our trials on this 
earth. 

Thus puritanism secures the support of all the 
large business interests and becomes well nigh ir- 
resistible. 

The shallow point of view of organized puritan- 
ism is revealed clearly in a letter from John S. 
Sumner to the writer, dated April 9, 1920. "The 
influence exerted by such publications, iriany mov- 
ing pictures and many dramatic productions, di- 
rectly harmfully affects family relations and the 
home which is the basis of our social order. We 
feel, therefore, that we are doing a fundamental 
service in seeking to suppress those things which 
would destroy the basis of our social order." 

At a time when unpardonable increases in 
rentals, in the cost of food and clothing are making 

[263] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



it impossible for family men to retain their homes, 
Mr. Sumner boasts of protecting them against 
vicious publications, lewd shows and movies. Sex- 
ual obsession could not be confessed more frankly. 

Puritanism, be it of the undersexed or of the 
oversexed sort, kills all art manifestations. Art is 
expression, not repression, and curiously enough, 
even some of the freer minds among the art critics 
are yielding to the puritanical pressure and, now 
and then, praise an actor, a painter or a sculptor 
for his "power of repression." 

Not only the pictorial arts and literature have 
been stifled in puritan-ridden lands but music even 
has been neglected. 

Remember the absurd statements may by Tolstoy, 
who was tortured by sexual obsessions and dis- 
covered lewdness even in Beethoven's compositions. 
Few conductors and even fewer orchestra musicians 
hail from puritan lands. Whatever symphonic 
compositions such lands have produced could be 
all ignored in a survey of the world's musical 
achievements. 

Puritans, however, are looking forward to con- 
quests in new territories, some of which had never 
before been invaded by lay authorities. 

The March, 1920, issue of the report of the New 
York Society for the Suppression of Vice contains 
[264] 



Destructive Persecution 



two especially distressing items: an announcement 
that a medical publication has submitted an article 
for revision by the society; this would indicate 
that unless powerful opposition is raised against 
such attempts, science is to become "bowdlerized/' 
which probably means that at some future time 
venereal clinics will be abolished and operations 
on the abdomen re-christened operations on the 
stomach. 

Finally the society having hauled into court some 
offender who was let off with a suspended sen- 
tence, "warned the offender to leave town." 

This is destructive persecution of the worst type, 
lacking in social intelligence, dumping perverts 
or criminals upon other communities, getting rid 
of a disease by trying to let the neighbour catch 
it, as savages, with the help of witches, are wont to 
do. 

The puritan neurosis will probably pass away 
when the forces which support it have been fettered 
and made harmless and when the forces which 
carry out its decrees, courts and police, having been 
reformed, will no longer need to hide their moral 
and ethical inferiority under the mask of sexual 
austerity. 



[265] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



BIBLIOGRAPHY 

The official biography of Anthony Comstock "An- 
thony Comstock, Fighter," by C. G. Trumbull (Flem- 
ing, Revell) is the best source of information as to the 
workings of the puritanical mind. T. Schroeder in his 
"Free Press Anthology," C. Pollock in the Bulletin of the 
Authors' League of America for March, 1917, H. L. 
Mencken in his "A Book of Prefaces" (Alfred A. Knoff), 
and Frank Harris in Pearsons Magazine for June, 1917, 
cite innumerable cases of puritanical suppression of free 
thought and free expression in literature and art. Also 
consult the Monthly Report of the New York Society 
for the Suppression of Vice which is a record of the 
"lawful" activities of the organized puritans. 



[266] 



VI. THE PSYCHOANALYTIC TREATMENT 



CHAPTER I. HYPNOTIST AND ANALYST 

"I suppose suggestion plays a great part in the 
psychoanalytic treatment," is a statement which 
every analyst hears frequently and has to deny em- 
phatically. Hypnotism and psychoanalysis not 
only have nothing in common but are in fact the ex- 
act opposite of each other: hypnotism introduces 
something into the subject's mind, psychoanalysis 
takes something out of it. 

The hypnotist takes certain ready-made ideas, 
generally considered as ethical or practical, and, 
taking chances with their acceptability, tries to 
make the subject accept them because they are 
likely to be beneficial to him. 

The psychoanalyst, having slowly and carefully 
amassed evidence as to certain ideas which are ob- 
sessing the subject and are likely to wreck his 
health, proceeds to disintegrate them and helps the 
subject to eliminate them. 

The charge often made by ill-informed oppo- 
nents of psychoanalysis, among them Boris Sidis, 
that people may be wrecked and perverted by the 
sexual thoughts suggested in the course of an 

[269] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



analysis, reveals a profound ignorance of the psy- 
choanalytic procedure. 

The Freudian school is the only one to lay much 
emphasis on the sexual element, but the orthodox 
Freudian is an almost extinct species. Even he, 
however, should be cleared of every suspicion of 
sexual suggestion. The sexual material is present 
in every subject, normal or abnormal, and comes 
to the surface very easily. No suggestion is neces- 
sary to bring it forth. 

The Freudians consider sex as the all-important 
factor in the neurosis. The other schools are in- 
clined to seek, behind the sexual mask, other fac- 
tors assuming a sexual complexion for abnormal 
reasons. Adler has stated many times that imag- 
inary sexuality deceives the subject but should 
not deceive the analyst. If an analyst of the Ad- 
lerian school ever tried to suggest anything to his 
subjects it would be the belief that sex is not al- 
ways sex. 

But no analyst ever suggests anything. As we 
shall see at the end of this chapter, as soon as the 
rapport between analyst and subject is such that 
the subject is too easily influenced by the analyst, 
the analysis is likely to prove a failure. 

One of the reasons for the widely spread belief 
that hypnotism and psychoanalysis are related 
[270] 



What Discouraged Jung 



methods of treatment is the fact that several of the 
best-known analysts originally practised hypno- 
tism. 

It was while studying a patient in hypnotic 
"trances" that Freud suspected the possibility of 
a study of the unconscious in the waking state. 
Freud made a deep study of hypnotism under men 
like Charcot of the Salpetriere and Bernheim and 
Liebault of Nancy. He soon realized, however, 
the shortcomings of the hypnotic method and dis- 
carded it entirely. 

Jung, of Zurich, was discouraged from using 
hynotism by the brilliant and spurious successes 
he achieved through it. An old woman among 
others who would call at his office complaining of 
some excruciating pains, fall asleep in three sec- 
onds and before he had time to even suggest any- 
thing, wake up, thank him and go away, convinced 
him that the hypnotist is simply aiding and abetting 
an unconscious fraud. 

It may be, however, that if Freud, Jung, Fer- 
enczi and the many others who started in life as 
hypnotists and, after a while, became psychoana- 
lysts, had not become familiar with the psychology 
of suggested sleep, they would have been at pains 
to understand the mechanism of certain neuroses. 

All students of psychoanalysis should glance at 

[271] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



a few books on hypnotism for that very reason. 
It would enable them to convince themselves of 
the neurotic character of that practice. 

There are, briefly speaking, three methods of 
hypnotizing people: A man of powerful physique 
and of impressive appearance often succeeds in 
hypnotizing subjects by ordering them in a stern 
voice to fall asleep. This method is especially ef- 
fective with weak, timid, feminine subjects. Some 
memory of the father's authority is evidently at 
work in such cases and compels obedience. 

Other subjects can only be prevailed to enter 
the hypnotic state in a quiet, dimly lighted room, 
when the hypnotist keeps up a flow of soothing, 
monotonous, often senseless words, spoken in a 
low, crooning voice and strokes the face and hands 
of the subject. This is the method employed by 
every mother singing her infant to sleep and sur- 
rounding him with a peace and monotony symbol- 
ical of absolute security. 

Nervous fatigue is relied upon in other cases to 
induce artificial sleep, the subject being asked to 
concentrate his gaze on a brilliant object, such as 
a diamond held in one position or moved about, or 
to listen to the ticking of a watch, etc. 

Between ten and twenty per cent, of all the sub- 
jects examined have been found impossible to hyp- 
[272] 



Regression in Hypnose 



notize. No conclusion should be drawn from that 
condition as to their normality. They may be so 
normlal and independent that the idea of submitting 
to any one else's will is repellent to them. They 
may be so abnormal that their refusal to be hypno- 
tized is a desperate resistance against the prac- 
titioner endeavouring to cure their neurotic symp- 
toms. 

That the hypnotic condition verges on a neurose 
is made evident by several of its characteristics. 

The fact that it can be best induced in certain 
cases by a man of the Svengali type and that fakers 
have better percentages of success than scientific 
experimenters points to a childish regression and 
a father fixation. The mother fixation may explain 
satisfactorily the second method. 

The regression is shown in many cases by the 
childhood memories which constitute the woof of 
the subject's talk unless the hypnotist imposes by 
suggestion a different topic. 

All consciousness of time generally disappears 
in hypnosis and the abolition of time seems to 
cause the subject a great deal of satisfaction. This 
reminds us of the epileptic fits so well described 
by Dostoyevsky and in the course of which Mishkin, 
the Idiot, exulted in the thought that there would 
be no more time limitations. 

[273] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



The majority of hypnotized subjects have a feel- 
ing of pressure all over their body which is a source 
of most pleasurable feelings. 

The Freudians have come to the plausible con- 
clusion that this is a memory from the pre- 
natal days when the fetus was submitted in the 
mother's womb to an even pressure of similar 
character. 

Many more points of similarity between neu- 
rotic and hypnotic states could be mentioned. 
Every neurose is a form of auto-suggestion. The 
subject imagines he has a large amount of evidence 
for certain obsessive thoughts and beliefs. At the 
end of an analysis, the evidence has been disin- 
tegrated and destroyed. The hypnotized subject 
who carries out some command given by the hyp- 
notist will, if questioned, present excellent and 
plausible reasons for performing actions he cannot 
help performing. After being assisted in remem- 
bering the beginnings of the hypnotic scene, how- 
ever, he will gradually regain his consciousness of 
all that transpired and realize that his "reasons" 
were an unconscious fabrication. 

Just as a neurose creates physical symptoms 
through auto-suggestion, Charcot and the Nancy 
hypnotists have shown that almost any hysterical 
symptom can be induced under hypnose and a com- 
[274] 



Another Escape from Reality 



parison of the two processes is extremely illum- 
inating. 

In acute neurotic cases there is even a form of 
refusal to be analysed which can be compared to 
the refusal to be hypnotized. 

It happens sometimes, in the course of an analy- 
sis, that when the examination reaches a crucial 
point, the subject develops a physical ailment which 
for the time being or for a more or less extended 
period of time places him beyond the analyst's 
reach. 

A subject may feel suddenly distressed and ask 
for permission to leave the room, or the appoint- 
ments are postponed on account of some gastric or 
ahdominal disturbance unconsciously improvised 
for the occasion. 

Shall we then attempt to relieve neurotic symp- 
toms through a procedure which affects so many 
neurotic traits? 

The neurotic who consults a hypnotist is, after 
all, seeking a quick escape from reality, from 
effort, from responsibilities. 

He sees in the practitioner treating him the parent 
image and "runs back to father or mother" re- 
gressing to the age at which he had all his problems 
solved and the responsibility never weighed very 
heavily on his shoulders. He seeks the line of 

[275] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



least effort. Too often an analyst has the impres- 
sion brought to bear forcibly on him that the sub- 
ject places himself in his hands and will hold him 
responsible henceforth for all the acts of his life. 

Unable to lean upon his parents any longer the 
neurotic seeks a substitute for them. 

Physician and analyst must see at once through 
the threadbare schelmes of the subject and not en- 
courage that attitude. They must bend all their 
energies to one end, to making the patient entirely 
independent from them. 

Take one subject who feels weak and easily tired 
and hence unable to perform certain necessary and 
unpleasant tasks. 

The hypnotist will repeat to him during each 
"trance" that he is strong, strong enough to do his 
work. 

But the weak patient is weakened by complexes 
which hypnosis does not remove. Hence the prob- 
ability is that after that form of treatment the pa- 
tient, unable to really feel strong, because he is not 
strong, will adopt one of the negative attitudes I 
have described in a previous chapter, "1 will act 
as though I were strong," after which he will en- 
gage, according to his temperament, in boasting or 
disparaging, bullying or scheming, to prove his in- 
existent strength to himself and others. He may 
[276] 



A Waste of Energy- 



enter a slightly agitated maniac state, followed by 
the inevitable reaction, depression. 

Many serious experimenters have come to the 
conclusion that we cannot suggest anything to a 
subject unless he unconsciously craves to do that 
very thing. Suggestions of unpleasant actions are 
either rejected or very ephemeral. Suggesting 
murder or suicide proves effective mainly in the 
movies. Lombroso saw his subjects wake up every 
time he ordered them to perform humiliating tasks 
or to assume degrading roles. 

Our ethical and social notions, our prejudices 
and fears dominate the hypnotic state as they do the 
waking state. 

Not only is the hypnotic method dangerous for 
it encourages formis of regression which are the 
basis of the neuroses, but it is an inefficient and 
haphazard procedure. 

How can we know what suggestion will be ac- 
ceptable to the subject because unconsciously he has 
already accustomed himself to it and is expecting 
it? Must we make hundreds of experiments, each 
of which weakens the patient's will a little more, in 
order to strike by mere chance a suggestion which 
will be both beneficial and acceptable, hence dur- 
able? 

This applies not only to the form of hypnotism 

[277] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



which implies suggestions from hypnotist to sub- 
ject but to the hypnotic rest cure devised by Wetter- 
strand of Upsal. Wetterstrand simply put his pa- 
tients asleep and kept them in that condition, some- 
times for days and weeks, in a house especially 
fitted for that purpose. 

Sleepless subjects must have derived some com- 
fort from that treatment, granted, however, that they 
were not, in the course of that hypnotic sleep, tor- 
tured and weakened by anxiety dreams, one thing 
which could not be prevented or checked. To the 
average neurotic, on the other hand, that protracted 
drowsiness must have offered a dangerous means of 
escape from the reality which they should have been 
trained to face. 

In the course of an analysis, the analyst, as I said 
before, is most careful not to offer any suggestions, 
for suggestions would be accepted by friendly sub- 
jects in order to please the analyst, and by hostile 
subjects to get rid of the analyst. 

When asking the subject for his reactions to the 
various stimulus words used for that purpose, the 
analyst simply asks the impersonal question: what 
comes to your mind when you hear this word? 

He avoids forms of examination which would 
practically dictate the proper answer to the patient, 
such as: Does not this remind you of . • • ? 
f278] 



The Bald Hair Specialist 



He listens carefully, patiently, uncritically 
though sympathetically. 

He may have certain theories as to the subject's 
trouble, its cause, origin, character, etc., but he 
never airs them before the subject. 

It may be objected that a certain amount of in- 
voluntary suggestion is quite unavoidable. The 
element designed unscientifically as personal mag- 
netism plays in all human relations a part which 
cannot be minimized. 

A letter to a daily paper which publishes health 
advice by a very bald physician revealed in an 
amusing way the illogical effects of personal im- 
pressions. The correspondent was anxious to find 
a tonic for his rapidly thinning hair, but wished to 
have his inquiry referred to another physician than 
Dr. X, for the latter' s denuded skull made him in 
his estimation unfit to prescribe for his trouble. 

As a matter of fact, a man affected by calvities 
is more likely to have investigated hair restorers 
than a man with a healthy shock of hair, but the 
person who wrote the letter I mentioned felt that 
in such matters he could not trust a bald phy- 
sician. 

An athletic physical instructor will easily im- 
press his pupils with the probable excellence of his 
method and an analyst who seems unlikely to ever 

[279] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



be affected by any nervous ailments will create in 
his subject's mind a confidence which facilitates his 
work. 

Jung says very frankly somewhere that practi- 
tioners who manage to invest themselves with the 
halo of the medicine man are wise in every respect. 
Not only do they have a large practice but they 
also obtain the best results. Dealing with neu- 
rotics, the medical exorcist shows to his subjects his 
full valuation of the "psychic" element when he 
gives them, an opportunity to fasten their faith to 
his mysterious personality. 

That type of healer generally has a large prac- 
tice but I disagree with Jung as to the final, not 
the temporary, results of such cures. 

Emotional cures have been observed in thou- 
sands of cases, but they are seldom lasting, for they 
eliminate the symptoms, not the deeper factors 
causing the symptoms to appear. 

Powdering up a red nose will have strikingly 
good temporary effects but the only way to deal 
with that sympton is to cure the gastric disturbance 
which is responsible for it. 

Analysis does not powder up red noses. It seeks 
to determine the line of least resistance for the de- 
velopment of a harmonious personality. It tries 
to find out what the neurotic's unconscious is striv- 



[280] 



Talking Cures 



ing for and actually doing in an abnormal way. 
After destroying the absurd reasons which the 
neurotic advances for his abnormal behaviour, it 
tries to determine in collaboration with the subject 
himself a positive, vital, socially beneficial guid- 
ing line. 

But it does not begin to seek that guiding line 
until the subject has been made entirely free from 
his complexes. 

And here again we must establish a sharp dis- 
tinction between psychoanalysis and the talking 
cures made popular, especially in Europe, by the 
late Dr. Dubois, and which is little more than an at- 
tempt at suggestion in the waking state. 

Dubois' system of therapy, which consists in giv- 
ing to the subject moral reasons for his recovery 
and in discussing rationally his case, is temporarily 
efficient if the subject is deeply impressed with the 
practitioner's personality and is ready to yield to 
his arguments. 

The Dubois method bans all conversation about 
the past and tries on every occasion to turn the sub- 
ject's glance toward the future, which psycho- 
logically is correct, for the neurosis is a regression 
to the past and to outworn solutions. 

That procedure is really the second part of the 
psychoanalytic treatment. But the first part of it 

[281] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



cannot be skipped. Before erecting a building one 
must clear the ground of all obstructions and blast 
the rocks which stand in the way. 

Conscious advice is very weak against the posi- 
tive orders which come from our unconscious, and 
here again, as in the case of hypnotic commands, 
only that sort of advice for which the unconscious 
is prepared will find ready acceptance and be per- 
manently followed. 

Complex after complex must be disintegrated 
and the subject must first be made conscious that 
most of his unconscious cravings are not repre- 
sentative of the intellectual, social and ethical level 
on which he should stand but survivals of, or re- 
gressions to, conditions obtaining at lower, that is, 
more archaic levels. 

Some of his unconscious cravings will be found 
to lead him along a straight, positive, path. His 
dreams prove especially valuable in determining 
what his aptitudes are as well as his abnormal modes 
of wishfulfilment. 

The task of the analyst, after he has freed the 
subject from his thraldom to an archaic uncon- 
scious, is to select in an unprejudiced way from 
all the unconscious material brought to the surface 
that which is positive, which shows beneficial adap- 
tability to the subject's environment, which is cap- 
[282] 



Latent Ability 



able of gratifying in a socially useful way the 
various urges struggling for expression. 

Both in the clearing of the ground and in the 
building of the new structure, the analyst proceeds 
scientifically, according to convincing evidential 
data. 

Both reactions and dreams show him what the 
subject can actually do and is predisposed to do, 
what actual help and hindrance the subject may 
derive from his unconscious; dreams, in par- 
ticular, registering minutely as they do, the sub- 
ject's progress in regaining his freedom, reveal ac- 
curately the time when advice touching a positive 
guiding line can be given openly. 

If you have to deal for instance with a subject in 
whom the egotistical trend is strongly marked, you 
must at first disintegrate the false growths whereby 
his craving expresses itself indirectly and ab- 
normally. After which, when the subject has ac- 
quired full insight into his conduct and is re-shap- 
ing his attitudes accordingly, the analyst can en- 
courage certain forms of activity offering positive 
gratification to the subject's egotism and yet fitting 
perfectly in the environment in which he must live. 

A neurotic with a decided talent in some direc- 
tion can be led from a negative life of disparage- 
ment, slander, bitterness, in which he is only re- 

[283] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



ducing others to a lower level, to a positive life of 
accomplishment, in which a development of his 
abilities will gain him fame and power. 

In other words, hypnotism only offers to sufferers 
a negative escape from; reality, psychoanalysis a 
permanent formula for exchanging a negative life 
for a positive one; hypnotism makes sufferers de- 
pendent upon the hypnotist, psychoanalysis makes 
them independent from the analyst. 

And yet, there imay be exceptional cases in which 
hypnotism may be used legitimately. While no 
physician believes in administering strong narcotics, 
no physician will hesitate to inject large doses 
of morphine into an unfortunate person who is, let 
us say, being crushed to death under a railroad 
train and cannot be lifted from under the wheels 
until emergency apparatus has come. 

In a case, for instance, when a neurotic is in- 
capacitated by some of his symptoms, such as 
a sick headache, from performing some im- 
portant task upon which his livelihood or reputa- 
tion depends, an analyst would have a sufficient ex- 
cuse for saving his subject from the added strain 
which might be caused by failure. But that form 
of treatment should only be resorted to in a grave 
emergency with the understanding that the pro- 
cedure shall not be repeated. For the majority of 
[284] 



Sleep or Talk 



neurotics would rather sleep than talk and would 
rather regress to their abnormal ideas than to sub- 
mit them to the destructive fire of psychoanalytic 
conversation. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

The most authoritative book on the subject is Smith 
Ely Jelliffe's "The Technique of Psychoanalysis" (Nerv- 
ous and Mental Disease Pub. Co.) , a volume of 160 pages 
covering the following points: Material to be analysed; 
whom to analyse; the literature, sources and history of 
psychoanalysis; the analytic procedure; the Oedipus 
complex as a psychological measuring unit; the trans- 
ference; the resistances; the overcoming of the conflicts; 
the socialization of the personality; the practical use 
of the patients' dreams in analysis, etc. 

Poul Bjerre's "The Theory and Practice of Psycho- 
analysis" contains many practical suggestions and illus- 
trations of the analytical procedure. 



[285] 



VII. THE FOUR SCHOOLS OF 
PSYCHOANALYSIS 



CHAPTER 1: FREUD. THE PIONEER 

There are few orthodox Freudians at the present 
day. Few analysts accept all the conclusions which 
the creator of psychoanalysis reached, but all of 
them without any exception accept his premises. 
There is a psychoanalytic point of view which is 
common to the four principal exponents of the sci- 
ence, Freud, Jung, Adler and Kempf. 

I have told elsewhere how Freud gradually came 
to that point of view, discarding many of his earlier 
theories as new evidence compelled this most con- 
scious and modest of scientists to revise his own 
findings. 

This chapter will be devoted to a brief exposition 
of the Freudian theories. In the chapters devoted 
to Jung, Adler and Kempf, I shall endeavour to 
bring out further details of it by showing to what 
extent these scientists disagree with the great 
pioneer. 

The Freudian point of view is presented prin- 
cipally in three of Freud's books, the "Three Con- 
tributions to the Sexual Theory," the "Psycho- 
pathology of Every Day Life" and the "Interpre- 

[289] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



tation of Dreams." The lectures he delivered at 
Clark University when he visited the United States 
and his "Introduction to Psychoanalysis" supply 
laymen with a clear and intelligible summary of his 
theories. 

Freud considers that a study of dreams is the 
surest way to penetrate man's unconscious. The 
dreams of children are very easily understood: 
they are invariably the fulfilment of wishes which 
were aroused in children during the day and were 
not satisfied. The dreams of adults present more 
difficulties. They undergo a process of distortion, 
of disguise. The idea which underlies them was 
meant for a quite different verbal expression. 

The manifest dream content is a disguised sub- 
stitute for the unconscious dream thoughts, and this 
disguise is the work of the defensive forces of the 
ego, of the resistances. 

These prevent the repressed wishes from enter- 
ing the consciousness in our waking hours, and even 
in the relaxation of sleep, they are still strong 
enough to force them to hide themselves under a 
mask, to don a symbolical disguise. 

By studying the irruptive ideas which arise 
through free association, we can discover the ac- 
tual dream thoughts. 

They are no longer incomprehensible; they are 
[290] 



Wish Fulfilment in Dreams 



associated with the impressions of the day preced- 
ing the dream and appear as the fulfilment of un- 
gratified wishes. 

The manifest dream which we remember after 
waking jmay then be described as the disguised ful- 
filment of repressed wishes. 

The analysis of dreams reveals, according to 
Freud, the unsuspected importance which impres- 
sions and experiences from early childhood exert 
on human beings. In the dream life of the adult, 
the child continues to live and retain all the traits 
and wishes he ever had, even those which he was 
obliged to abandon in later years. Dream study 
enables one to realize through what complicated 
processes of development, repression, sublimation 
and reaction the normal adult has gradually grown 
out of the child. 

Anxiety dreams do not invalidate the theory of 
wish fulfilment, for anxiety is one of the ways in 
which the ego relieves itself of repressed wishes 
which have become too strong and, therefore, anx- 
iety can easily be experienced if the dream has 
gone too far toward the fulfilment of an objection- 
able wish. 

Faulty actions are another class of phenomena 
which throw much light upon the workings of our 
unconscious. The forgetting of things which one 

[291] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviqjir 



is supposed to know, like proper names, in 
certain cases, slips of the tongue, mistakes in 
writing or reading, the automatic execution of pur- 
posive acts in wrong situations, the loss or break- 
ing of certain objects, all these are trifles for which 
no one before Freud had sought a psychological 
explanation and which had always been considered 
as the consequences of absent-mindedness, inatten- 
tion, etc. 

This should also include actions and gestures 
which the subject performs unknowingly, such as 
playing with objects (buttons, pencils), humming 
melodies, handling one's person or clothing and the 
like. 

These insignificant actions are not without mean- 
ing. They spring from the same sort of repressed 
wishes which are at the bottom of our dreams. 

Such investigation, Freud states, trace back the 
symptoms of mental disease with surprising regular- 
ity to impressions from the sexual life. They show 
that the pathogenic wishes are erotic cravings and 
that disturbances of the erotic sphere are the most 
important factors of mental disease. 

Psychoanalysis may at first trace the symptoms, 
not to sexual happenings but to banal traumatic 
experiences. This distinction, however, loses its 
significance through other circumstances. The 
[292] 



Childish Sexuality 



analytic research work which is necessary for the 
thorough explanation and the complete cure of 
mental disease does not stop in any case with the 
experiences which coincided with the onset of the 
disease. It goes back in every case to the ado- 
lescence and childhood of the patient. Here only 
does Freud find the impressions and experiences 
which determine the later sickness. It is the in- 
compatible, repressed wishes of childhood which 
lend their power to the creation of symptoms. 

These mighty wishes of childhood are very gen- 
erally sexual in their nature. 

Sexual impulses do not enter the child's life at 
puberty; the child brings them with him into the 
world and from these, what we call the "normal" 
sexuality of the adult gradually develops. 

The sexual impulse of the child is very complex 
and can be analysed into many components arising 
from different sources. It is not at first related 
to the function of reproduction. It enables the 
child to secure various forms of pleasurable sensa- 
tions such as the auto-excitation of certain particu- 
larly sensitive parts of the body, genitals, rectum, 
skin and other surfaces. Thumb sucking is a good 
example of this form of gratification. 

As in this first phase of the child's sexual life 
the child finds the gratification he seeks in his own 

I293J 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



body, Freud calls this period the period of auto- 
erotism. 

Besides auto-erotic manifestations, Freud finds 
in the early life of the child impulse components 
of the libido which presuppose a second person as 
their object. 

These impulses appear in opposed pairs, active 
and passive. The most important pairs of this 
group are sadism and masochism, the pleasure of 
inflicting pain and the pleasure of suffering pain 
and the active and passive forms of exhibitionism 

From the passive form of exhibitionism is de 
rived the impulse toward artistic or histrionic rep 
resentation. From the active form, scientific curi 
osity. 

The differences between the sexes play no very 
important part in the child's life and there is in 
every child a homosexual tendency. 

The sexual life of the child, varied but inorgan- 
ized, in which each single craving goes about seek- 
ing its satisfaction independently from the others, 
becomes gradually organized in two directions and, 
at the time of puberty, the definite sex of the in- 
dividual is clearly determined. 

The various cravings submit themselves to the 
primacy of the genital zone and the entire sexual 
life is taken over into the service of procreation* 
[294] 



Morbid Predispositions 



Object choice prevails over auto-erotism and the 
love object satisfies all the separate cravings of the 
sex urge. 

But many of the original components of that urge 
are given no share in the final shaping of the sex- 
ual life. Even before the advent of puberty, cer- 
tain cravings had been submitted to the strongest 
repression by education. Shame, disgust, morality 
prevent the repressed cravings from asserting them- 
selves. 

Every process of development brings with itself 
the germ of pathological predispositions whenever it 
is inhibited, delayed or incompletely carried out. 
This is true of the sexual development. In some 
individuals it may not be completed and it may 
leave in its wake abnormalities or a predisposition 
to later diseases by the way of regression. Some 
cravings which have not fallen under the domina- 
tion of the genital zone may cause a perversion. 
The original equality of the sexes may be main- 
tained and homosexualism is the result. 

The neuroses contain the same cravings found in 
perversions but in a negative form. Those crav- 
ings have undergone a repression but maintain 
themselves as complexes in the unconscious. 

Exaggerated expression of a craving in very 
early life leads to a fixation. 

[295] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



The child takes both parents as an object of his 
erotic wishes but soon singles out one of them, fol- 
lowing in that respect the example set by his par- 
ents, the father preferring his daughter, the mother, 
her son. The child reacts to that choice and if a 
son, wishes himself in the place of his father, if a 
daughter in the place of her Imother. 

The feelings aroused by such relations between 
parents and offspring are not only of a positive and 
affectionate nature but of a hostile and negative 
nature as well. 

A situation ensues which can be roughly repre- 
sented by the myth of Oedipus, who killed his father 
and married his mother. 

This fixation which is submitted at an early age 
to a strong repression is to Freud's mind the cen- 
tral complex of every neurosis. 

About the time when the child is still obsessed 
by this complex his attention is drawn towards the 
processes of reproduction and he begins to seek 
solutions for the question : where do children come 
from? Children build up at that time a number 
of pregnancy and birth theories which reappear in 
later life in many neuroses. 

The neurotic disturbance is simply the in- 
dividual's flight from a reality in which his re- 
pressed cravings cannot be gratified. The resist- 
[296] 



The Modern Cloister 



ance of the neurotic against any cure is due to the 
fact that he is not certain that the substitute grati- 
fication offered him by his sickness can be replaced 
in reality by something better. 

The neurotic flight from reality takes place over 
the path of regression, through a return to earlier 
stages of life in which gratification was not lacking. 
The regression is a twofold one, for the libido re- 
gresses not only to an earlier stage of development, 
but also adopts primitive, archaic forms of ex- 
pression. 

We are all, whether we are normal or abnormal, 
seeking an escape from, reality. The strong, en- 
ergetic man tries by dint of labour to make his 
wishes come true and generally succeeds. If the 
individual displeased with reality possesses artistic 
talent he can transform his fancies into artistic 
creations. The neurosis takes in our days the place 
of the cloister in which the weak and disappointed 
took refuge. 

The neurosis has no psychic content of its own 
which cannot be found in healthy minds. The 
struggle for life leads either to success and health, 
or to compensatory activities or to the neurosis. 

Freud has divided mental disturbances into 
neuroses, psychoneuroses and psychoses. 

The true neuroses are anxiety neurosis and 

[297] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



neurasthenia. Their cause lies in the present and 
in the abnormal condition of the sexual function. 

The psycho-neuroses are hysteria and the ob- 
session neurosis, in which the real causative fac- 
tors belong to the patients 9 early childhood. 

In psychoneuroses as well as in neuroses the 
factors of the disturbance are sexual, but in the 
psychoneuroses the influence of heredity is more 
important. 

Heredity finds its expression in a peculiar psy- 
chosexual constitution which asserts itself in an 
abnormally strong and many-sided instinctive life 
and a resultant sexual precocity. 

Between the compelling instinct and the opposing 
force of sexual denial, the way is prepared for some 
disturbance which does not solve the conflict but 
seeks to escape it by changing the libidinous crav- 
ings into symptoms of disease. 

Besides actual heredity, however, there is a 
pseudo-heredity which is after all the influence of 
the environment. Neurotic parents may not pro- 
create neurotic children but they bring up their 
children to be neurotics. 

Freud does not classify the psychoses accord- 
ing to their clinical picture but according to their 
mechanism, into overpowering psychoses and de- 
fence psychoses. In the former, the unconscious 
[298] 



Insanity an Asset 



has completely overcome the conscious and the ego 
has torn itself loose from some unbearable idea. 
For instance a girl disappointed in love imagined 
for two months that she was living with her lover 
and in that abnormal way had her wishes ful- 
filled. 

The defence psychoses are characterized by the 
violent repression of an idea. In dementia prae- 
cox there is a withdrawal of the libido from the 
objects of the external world. Freud observed a 
group of paranoia cases arising from repression of 
painful memories. The libido fastening itself to 
the ego complex mfty lead to ideas of grandeur, 
which explains the connection between persecution 
mania and grandiose delusions. As far as the 
periodic melancholia is concerned, Freud asserts 
that it dissolves itself with unexpected frequency 
into obsessional ideas and obsessional affects. 

In other words, insanity is no longer considered 
as a brain disease or as a set of absurd symptoms 
grouped in varying clinical pictures. Insanity is 
an abnormal asset for the insane, a dream from 
which he does not awaken and which supplies him 
with an abnormal form of wish-fulfilment. 

The analytic treatment as outlined by Freud con- 
sists in letting the patient talk on any subject he 
pleases, since nothing can occur to him which does 

[299] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



not bear on the complex which the analyst is seek- 
ing. The patient often stops and pretends that he 
has nothing more to say. This indicates that the 
patient is holding back or rejecting certain ideas 
because his unconscious resistance masquerades 
as a critical judgment of the value of the ideas. 
The patient can avoid that if he is warned in ad- 
vance and told not to pass any judgment on the 
ideas that come to his mind, however unessential, 
irrelevant, nonsensical or personally unpleasant 
they may be. 

These irruptive ideas which the patient values 
little, "are to the analyst like the ore which can be 
transformed through simple processes into valu- 
able (metal." If one desires to gain in a short time 
a preliminary knowledge of the patient's repressed 
complexes, the examination can be conducted with 
the help of association experiments. 

This procedure is to the analyst what qualitative 
analysis is to the chemist. It may be dispensed 
with in the therapy of neurotic patients, but it is 
indispensable in the study of the psychoses. 

This is followed by dream study and the close 
observation of the patient's involuntary, faulty ac- 
tions, etc. 

Freud attaches a great importance to the phe- 
nomenon known as the transference which he con- 
[300] 



The Transference 



siders as further evidence of the sexual forces which 
are at the bottom of the neurosis. 

The patient, he says, directs toward the person 
of the physician a great amount of tender emotion, 
often mixed with enmity, which has no foundation 
in any real relation, and must be derived in every 
respect from the old wish-fancies of the patient 
which have become unconscious. 

Every fragment of his emotional life, which can 
no longer be called back into memory, is accord- 
ingly lived over by the patient in his relation to 
the physician, and only by living it over in the 
transference is he convinced of the power of those 
unconscious sexual stimuli. The symptoms 
which, to use a chemical expression, are the precipi- 
tates of earlier love experiences, using the word 
love in its broadest sense, can only be dissolved in 
the high temperature of the experience of trans- 
ference and transformed into other psychic prod- 
ucts. 

The phenomenon of transference is not created 
by the psychoanalytic treatment. It arises spon- 
taneously in all human relations and in the rela- 
tions of the patient to the physician. It is every- 
where the bearer of therapeutic influences and the 
stronger it is the less one is aware of its presence. 

Psychoanalysis does not create it but simply 

[301] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



reveals it to consciousness and avails itself of it 
to direct the psychic processes toward a certain 
goal. 

People ignorant of the analytic technique often 
express the fear that by causing certain unconscious 
cravings to rise to consciousness those cravings may 
overpower the patient's ethical strivings and rob 
him of his cultural acquisitions. 

Experience teaches, Freud states, that the physi- 
cal and mental power of a wish whose repression 
has failed, is incomparably stronger when it re- 
mains unconscious than when it is made conscious. 
The unconscious wish cannot- be influenced and is 
not hindered by strivings in the opposite direction, 
while the conscious wish is inhibited by other con- 
scious wishes of an opposite nature. 

What then becomes of the cravings which were 
set free by analysis? How can they be made harm- 
less for the individual? 

The craving is generally "consumed" during the 
analysis by the correct mental activity of opposite 
wishes which are conscious and more valuable 
socially. Repression is replaced by condemnation. 
This is easy, Freud thinks, as we have only in the 
majority of the cases, to efface the effects of earlier 
developmental stages of the ego. 

Analysis may also reveal that some unconscious 
[302] 



Sublimation 



cravings can be gratified in ways which would have 
been found earlier if the development of the indi- 
vidual had not been disturbed. The mere extirpa- 
tion of infantile wishes is not the ideal aim of 
development, for the neurotic loses, through his 
repressions, many sources of mental energy which 
could have been utilized for his character building 
and his life activities. 

Sublimation is a process which directs the energy 
of the infantile wish-stimuli toward a higher goal, 
eventually no longer sexual. The components of 
the sexual urge have a great capacity for sublima- 
tion and can exchange their sexual goal for one 
more remote and socially valuable. "To the 
utilization of the energy reclaimed in such a way, 
in the activities of our mental life, we probably owe 
the highest cultural achievements. As long as an 
impulse is repressed, it cannot be sublimated. 
After the removal of the repression, the way to 
sublimation is open." 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

The following books by the founder of the psycho- 
analytic science must be read before one can acquire a 
clear understanding of Freud's doctrines: 
Freud, S. — "Three Contributions to the Theory of Sex" 
(Nervous and Mental Disease Pub. Co.) 

[303] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



Freud, S. — "The Interpretation of Dreams" (Macmillan). 

Freud, S. — "The Psychopathology of Everyday Life" 
(Macmillan). 

Freud, S. — "Wit and the Unconscious" (Moffat, Yard). 

Freud, S. — "The Origin and Development of Psycho- 
analysis" (Clark University). 

Freud, S. — "The History of the Psychoanalytic Move- 
ment" (Nervous and Mental Disease Pub. Co.). 

Freud, S. — "Introduction to Psychoanalysis" (Boni and 
Liver ight). 
To understand the application of Freud's theories to 

purely morbid states one should consult Hitsehmann's 

"Freud's Theories of the Neuroses" (Moffat, Yard), a 

most reliable book of reference. 



[304] 



CHAPTER II: JUNG. THE ZURICH SCHOOL 

Dr. Carl G. Jung of Zurich, Switzerland, one of 
Freud's disciples, has developed his master's views, 
broadening them out in certain respects but impart- 
ing to them in other respects a great deal of vague- 
ness. 

Freud's conception of the libido does not satisfy 
Jung. He conceived that urge as a force reaching 
far beyond the confines of sexuality or love even 
in their broadest sense. To him this force is a 
mysterious thing, similar to Bergson's Vital Urge, 
and which manifests itself not merely through sex 
and other hedonist activities, but through organic 
growth and development, and through all mental 
and intellectual activities. 

He agrees with Freud that the instinct of repro- 
duction is at the basis of hundreds of manifestations 
which at the present day seem to have completely 
lost all the sexual significance they once had, but 
he refuses, on account of their present character, to 
designate them as sexual. 

In place of a sexual viewpoint, Jung introduces 
into abnormal psychology an energic viewpoint. 

[305] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



The first manifestation of the libido or vital 
energy is the instinct of nutrition. From this stage 
the libido slowly develops through the many activi- 
ties of the act of sucking into the sexual function. 
Hence he does not consider the act of sucking as a 
sexual act. The pleasure derived from sucking 
the mother's nipple cannot be considered as a 
sexual pleasure but as a nutritional pleasure, for 
Jung does not see anywhere any evidence that 
pleasure in itself is sexual. 

It is because the libido attaches itself to an object 
or withdraws itself from it that the object interests 
us or appeals to us. The object itself is indifferent. 
The neurotic has no conscious reason for the outflow 
or the withdrawal of his libido, but when there is 
an exaggerated interest for one object, there is a 
consequent lack of energy elsewhere. 

The second point on which Jung disagrees with 
Freud is the meaning of the childish manifestations 
of sexuality which Freud calls "polymorphous per- 
verse" because of their similarity to the abnormal 
phenomena of adult life known as perversions. 

Jung refuses to use the word perverse in connec- 
tion with those infantile activities. They are to his 
mind the gradual enfoldment of sexuality. He 
divides life into three periods: the presexual period 
extending to the third or fourth year, in which the 
[306] 



The Polymorphous Perverse 



libido is mainly occupied with nutrition and growth, 
and corresponds roughly to the caterpillar stage of 
the butterfly. 

Then comes the prepubertal stage, from the 
fourth year to the age of puberty, followed by the 
period of maturity. 

In the presexual stage, the "polymorphous per- 
verse" activities arise from the general broadening 
of the libido which is no longer at the exclusive 
service of nutrition and begins to flow through many 
other channels. The childish habits are abandoned 
gradually, which means that a large amount of 
libido is withdrawn from them. 

If on the other hand the libido in its extension 
from nutrition to sex is arrested or retarded, a 
fixation may result, creating a disharmony, for the 
physical growth of the child cannot wait and never 
stops. A discrepancy arises between the infantile 
character of the child's emotional life and the needs 
of the more mature individual and the seed is sown 
for some maladaptation of the neurotic type. 

The child uses up a great amount of energy in 
day dreaming which compensates him for the thou- 
sand things which the world is denying him or 
rather taking away from him. 

As the human being passes from childhood into 
adulthood, the increasing demands which life 

[307] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



makes upon him compel him to abandon the world 
of fancies in which he spent so many hours. There 
again there may be a lingering of the libido 
in the phantasy stage and this leads to a 
condition called introversion. The introvert is 
characterized by the fact that his libido is turned 
toward his own personality and that he regards 
everything from, the point of view of his person- 
ality. The introvert lingers on situations and ex- 
periences which are a thing of the past, which are 
no longer of any import and which obscure to him 
the actual situation he should face. 

This constitutes another form of maladaptation 
to practical life with its various social aspects. 

The dominant factor in the child's life are the 
parents. 

At this point, Jung again disagrees with Freud. 
Jung admits that there are many neurotic persons, 
who, in their infancy and childhood, showed un- 
mistakable neurotic traits which in later life became 
more deeply marked. And he realizes also that 
the parents wield on the child's destiny, by their 
affection or lack of affection, wrong example, etc., 
an influence which is decisive for the child's future. 

The child's mentality may be so moulded by 
early influences that in later life he will constantly 
seek in the actual world conditions which dom,i- 
[308] 



The Parent Image 



nated in the family circle and will never be satisfied 
until he thinks he has drawn near that goal. 

But the adult is not conscious of those influences 
and may actually consider himself absolutely free 
from such tyranny, the more so as he often realizes 
the profound outward difference between present 
and past conditions and fails to notice their essential 
similarity. 

Therefore, Jung does not consider that the actual 
parents are the actual factors in a subject's attitude 
to life and its problems, but rather the distorted, 
often idealized, images of the parents, the father 
imago and the mother imago. 

To Jung, the Oedipus Complex is a purely sym- 
bolic situation in which the mother has absolutely 
no sexual significance for the child. 

It is not the mere existence of this complex, Jung 
writes, which characterizes the neurotic, for every- 
body has it in his unconscious, but the neurotic's 
strong attachment to it. This so-called fixation is 
probably a normal phenomenon. The fact that 
the neurotic seems markedly influenced by it shows 
that it is less a matter of fixation than of a peculiar 
use which he makes of his infantile past. He 
exaggerates its importance and attributes to it a 
great artificial value. 

The jealousy which even very young children 

[309] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



may show toward their father more or less corre- 
sponds to the displeasure which certain animals, 
dogs, for example, show in regard to strangers ap- 
proaching their masters or the caresses their masters 
may lavish on other dogs, cats, etc. Children prob- 
ably appreciate their mother most as a source of 
food, protection and physical comfort. Later, 
when eroticism begins to develop, the male child 
tends to prefer the mother, the female child the 
father, the male child experiencing something akin 
to sexual jealousy toward his father, the female 
child toward her mother. 

As puberty is attained, male and fetmale child 
free themselves from their too exclusive attachment 
for their parents and upon the extent of their detach- 
ment depends their future well being. 

This disentanglement is often accompanied by a 
severe struggle and a mental and physical crisis 
which Jung designates as the stage of self-sacrifice. 
In that period the childish tendencies and forms of 
love are sacrificed in order that the energy they 
consume may be freed and turned toward self- 
fulfilment aims. 

We now reach another important point whereon 
Jung separates himself from Freud. 

To Freud the many repressions which take place 
before and during the stage characterized by Jung 
[310] 



Adaptation to Life 



as the stage of self-sacrifice result in the accumula- 
tion of unconscious material constantly seeking an 
outlet. Hence to Freud, dreams are in their es- 
sence a symbolic veil for repressed desires which 
are in conflict with the ideals of the personality. 

To Jung the dream is a subliminal picture of the 
psychological condition of the individual in his 
waking state. It represents a resume of the sub- 
liminal association material which is brought 
together by the momentary psychological situation. 
The volitional meaning of the dream which Freud 
calls the repressed desire is to Jung a means of 
expression. 

The activity of the consciousness, speaking bio- 
logically, represents the psychological effort which 
the individual makes in adapting himself to the con- 
ditions of life. His consciousness endeavours to 
adjust itself to the necessities of the moment. In 
other words, there are tasks that the individual must 
perform, obstacles he must overcome. In many 
cases he is at a loss to find a solution and hence 
tends to refer to previous experiences of a more or 
less similar nature. We always try to understand 
the unknown which lies in the future in terms of 
the known which happened in the past. 

As Jung sees no reasons for supposing that the 
unconscious follows laws different from those nil- 

[311] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



ing conscious thought, he believes that the uncon- 
scious arrives at an understanding of the unknown 
by assimilating it to something which is known. 
When America was first discovered by the 
Spaniards, the Indians took the horses of the con- 
querors for huge pigs, for they were familiar with 
the appearance of pigs, had never seen horses and 
hence drew comparisons between the unknown 
horses and the well known pigs. 

Hence the wealth of symbols used in dreams. 

It is then the present conflict which, according 
to Jung, dominates our dream states and supplies 
their content. 

And it is the present conflict, too, Jung thinks, 
which causes the onset of the neurosis. Jung re- 
jects the Freudian view according to which the in- 
fantile past is the direct causes of the neurosis. 

Jung thinks that the regression to infantile or 
childish forms of thought or action is prompted by 
the patient's desire to withdraw as far as possible 
from the present. 

The conflict is produced by some important task 
which is essential for the fulfilment of the indi- 
vidual's destiny and which the subject refuses to 
perform. 

A sensitive and somewhat inharmonious char- 
acter will always meet with special difficulties and 
[312] 



The Neurotic s Individualism 



with greater obstacles than a perfectly normal and 
more resistant individual. For the neurotic, there 
are no established ways, as his aims and tasks are 
apt to be of a highly individual character. He 
tries to follow the more uncontrolled half-conscious 
ways of normal people, not fully realizing his own 
critical nature which imposes upon him more effort 
than the normal person is required to exert. There 
are children who show their increased sensitiveness 
and inadaptability in the very first w r eeks of their 
life by their difficulty in taking the breast, by their 
exaggerated nervous reactions. 

This predisposition is the cause of the first resist- 
ances against adaptation. In such cases the libido 
does not find its appropriate outlet and replaces 
modern and acceptable forms of adaptation by 
some abnormal, primitive forms. 

Infantile fantasies determine the form and fur- 
ther development of a neurosis but they do not 
constitute the origin of the neurosis. The fact that 
the patient himself may consider infantile fancies 
as the cause of his neurosis does not prove that he 
is right in his belief or that a theory following the 
same belief is right either. The fact that infantile 
fancies are exaggerated and put into the foreground 
is simply a consequence of the stored-up energy or 
libido. 

[313] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



The psychological trouble in neurosis and neu- 
rosis itself can be considered as an act of adaptation 
that has failed. A neurosis is, from a certain point 
of view, an attempt at self-cure. 

Jung's view of the neurosis does not prevent him 
from adhering to the Freudian mode of analysis. 
The analyst, according to Jung, must not imagine 
that, by unravelling the infantile fancies he is un- 
earthing the end roots of the disease. But he must 
uproot those fancies because the energy which the 
patient needs for his health, that is, for his adapta- 
tion, is attached to them. 

By means of psychoanalysis the connection be- 
tween the conscious life and the libido in the un- 
conscious is re-established. Thus this unconscious 
libido is placed anew at the service of conscious 
activity. Only in this way can split-off energy 
become again available for the accomplishment of 
the necessary tasks of life. 

To Jung, psychoanalysis is no longer a mere 
reduction of the individual to his primitive sexual 
wishes but "a high moral task of immense educa- 
tional value." It should not occupy itself with 
conflicts for which an external solution can be 
found unless it can adjust them through an internal 
solution. For example, some man dissatisfied with 
[314] 



Solving Conflicts 



his home life may think that all his difficulties 
would disappear if he married another woman. 
But the old Adam would probably bungle the new 
union as it bungled the old one. A real solution 
for many such conflicts only comes from within, 
and only then because the patient has been brought 
to a new standpoint. 

For example, the conflict between love and duty 
must be solved upon that particular plane of char- 
acter where love and duty are no longer in opposi- 
tion. The familiar conflict between instinct and 
conventional morality must be solved in such a way 
that both factors are taken into account and this is 
only possible through a change of character. 

Jung regards the question of the doctor's remain- 
ing true to his scientific convictions as rather unim- 
portant in comparison with the question as to how 
he can best help his patient. 

The analyst must be a teacher of ethics. Young 
neurotics must be made to realize that their search 
for a more valuable personality is often a cloak 
for the evasion of biological duty. Older patients 
looking back too obstinately toward the sexual valu- 
ation of youth may be simply retreating from a 
duty which demands the recognition of social 
values. In most cases the "canalization of the 

[315] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



libido" for the fulfilment of life's simple duties 
suffices to reduce to nothing many exaggerated de- 
sires. 

At the same time, Jung calls our attention to the 
fact that the question is not as simple as that and 
cannot always be solved in terms of "morality." 
"Immoral" tendencies cannot always be removed 
by analysis. On the contrary, some of them 
appear often more clearly and hence one must come 
to the conclusion that they belong to the individual's 
biological duties. This is no longer a problem for 
pathologists but for sociologists. This is especially 
true of certain sexual claims. Nature does not 
content herself with theories. At the present day 
we have no real sexual morality, only a legal atti- 
tude toward sexuality. Just as the early Middle 
Ages had no business ethics but only certain preju- 
dices and a legal standpoint. 

This obscure feeling that a new, more progres- 
sive world is needed constitutes, at times, a part of 
the neurotic complication. We must not forget 
that the moral law of today will be cast tomorrow 
into the melting pot to the end that it may serve 
at some future time as the basis of some new 
ethical structure. 

So it comes that there are many neurotics whose 
delicacy of feeling prevents them from being in 
[316] 



Finding Our Life Work 



agreement with present-day morality and who can- 
not adapt themselves to civilization as long as their 
moral code has gaps, the filling of which is the 
crying need of the age. 

Jung thinks that in many cases neurotics are neu- 
rotics, not because they are unsatisfied sexually or 
have not found the right mate or because they still 
are suffering from a fixation on their infantile sexu- 
ality: the real cause for their neurosis is, in many 
cases, their inability to recognize the work that is 
waiting for them,, of helping to build up a new 
civilization. 

In the past nothing can be altered, and in the 
present very little, but the future is ours. The 
neurotic is ill not because he has lost his old faith 
but because he has not as yet found a new form for 
his finest aspirations. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Beginners will find Jung's theories presented in a very 
lucid way in Beatrice M. Hinckle's introduction to Jung's 
"Psychology of the Unconscious" (Moffat, Yard). For 
more detail, consult C. G. Jung's "Analytical Psychology" 
(Moffat, Yard) in which the Swiss analyst not only dis- 
cusses his position in regard to the various problems of 
psychoanalysis but brings out the main points on which 
he disagrees with Freud and Adler. His correspondence 
with Dr. Loy, which is included in this volume, will 

[317] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



prove most interesting, as it reveals to the reader the 
mental evolution which led Jung from the practice of 
hypnotism to that of psychoanalysis. C. J. Jung's "The 
Association Method" (Clark University) explains very 
clearly some of the methods of analytical examination. 
Advanced students will find the development of his 
thought and its applications to religion and folk lore in 
his "Psychology of the Unconscious" and in his "Studies 
in Word-Association" (Moffat, Yard). 



[318] 



CHAPTER III: ADLER. INDIVIDUAL 
PSYCHOLOGY 

Adler does not call himself a psychoanalyst. 
After breaking away from the Freudian camp he 
designated his research work and his methods of 
psychiatry as Individual Psychology. The term 
has merits, for there are no cut-and-dried rules in 
the study and treatment of mental disturbances and 
every case must be approached from a different 
angle. It has not, however, been used by any one 
else in the literature of psychoanalysis. 

Freud considers human life as the result of the 
play of unconscious forces which drive us blindly 
and which we are in no way capable of leading or 
regulating. The repressed desires which are con- 
stantly seeking an outlet and which by creating an 
abnormal outlet for themselves upset at times our 
mental balance, serve no definite purpose. 

Jung, dissatisfied with this form of psychological 
fatalism, contended that the neurosis was an unsuc- 
cessful attempt at adjusting one's conduct to the 
problems of the present. 

Adler thinks that all the forces of the individual 

[319] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



are tending toward a definite goal and that in every 
manifestation of life we can find traces of a domi- 
nating or guiding idea. 

In other words, Freud emphasized the importance 
of the past, Jung that of the present, Adler that of 
the future. 

To Adler the most minute trait of psychic life is 
permeated with a purpose-force. Every psychic 
event bears the impress, or in other words is a 
sy|mbol of a uniformly directed plan of life which 
only comes to light more clearly in the neurosis. 
But none of the neurotic traits are characteristic of 
the neurotic exclusively. The neurotic shows no 
single idiosyncrasy which cannot be proved to exist 
in the healthy individual, although it may only be 
revealed to the subject or the analyst through 
analysis. 

Adler reached his psychological viewpoint after 
studying the effect which some organic inferiority 
has on the mental and physical health of the indi- 
vidual. While Freud started in life as a hypnotist 
and under the influence of Charcot and Bernheim, 
Adler' s first work was a monograph on Organ In- 
feriority. 

Nature is constantly at work to compensate for 
all the deficiencies found in the organism. If one 
kidney is removed the other grows larger and does 
[320] 



The Feeling of Incompleteness 



as much work as two did. If some of the heart 
valves are destroyed the muscular activity of the 
heart increases and thus the blood stream is kept in 
motion at the proper rate. But nature does more 
than that. An organ's capacity for work depends 
not only upon its physical condition but on the nerve 
impulses sent to it by the central nervous system. 
A defective organ may be made to function prop- 
erly through a vigorous exercise of the will. The 
weakened organ is likely to become, on that ac- 
count, unduly sensitive and in this peculiarity we 
can find the roots of nervous suffering. 

A patient suffering from nervous gastric or intes- 
tinal trouble, for instance, is often one who once 
suffered from such a disturbance and was cured. 
The ailment may have affected him in his early 
childhood, but the memory of it has been retained 
unconsciously and is recalled when the occasion 
arises. 

The neurotic, Adler says, suffers from a feeling 
of incompleteness for which he seeks compensation. 
The entire picture of the neurosis and all its symp- 
toms are influenced if not provoked by an imagi- 
nary fictitious goal. It is not the "libido" which 
is the 'motive force behind the phenomena of the 
neurosis, but the wish to be a complete man. The 
libido, the sex cravings and the tendencies to per- 

[321] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



versions become subjugated by this power. Adler 
in this respect agrees with Nietzsche's theory of the 
v/ill-to-power and will-to-seem and also with some 
of the older writers who held that the feeling of 
pleasure originates in a sense of power and the 
feeling of pain in a sense of weakness. 

Adler objects to Freud's contention that the neu- 
rosis has a sexual origin. The sexual picture, he 
says, deceives easily the normal person and more 
easily yet the neurotic, but it must not deceive the 
psychologist. The neurotic phenomenon is given 
a sexual tinge by the antithesis "masculine-femi- 
nine" which has gradually imposed itself upon hu- 
man thinking and which obsesses neurotic thinking. 
The assumption (now less generally spread, but uni- 
versal before the feminist moveSment began to check 
it) , that masculine meant also superior and strong, 
and that feminine meant inferior and weak, is 
gospel truth to the neurotic and a source of great 
suffering. 

The sexual trend in the neurotic's fancies and 
in his life leads toward the masculine goal. The 
whole picture of the sexual neurosis is simply a 
graphic presentation of the distance separating the 
patient from the imaginary masculine goal which 
he is trying to reach. 

The neurotic is not, as Freud thought, obsessed 
[322] 



A Sick GirVs Fancies 



by infantile wishes which come to life nightly 
through his dreams. For those infantile wishes are 
themselves subordinated to the fictitious goal, and 
adapt themselves to symbolic expression for the 
sake of convenience. 

A sickly girl who, during her childhood, was 
conscious of her insecurity and who has to rely 
entirely on her father as far as her present and 
future security is concerned, tends to usurp some 
of her mother's privileges and may imagine the en- 
tire situation in the form of an incest; she is taking 
the place of her mother in her father's affections; 
she is almost as important to her father as though 
she were her father's wife. She may never marry, 
for marriage with a stranger would not mean the 
security she finds with her father, who is stronger, 
wiser, and makes no physical demands likely to 
humiliate her ego. With a little imagination she 
may easily conjure up the symbolic picture of an 
incestuous relation. 

Freud saw in this fantasy a re-birth of infantile 
wishes. Adler sees in this attempt to reach into 
the remote past, in that tendency of the neurotic 
to abstraction and symbolization, a clever uncon- 
scious scheme to attain security, to vouchsafe to the 
ego the greatest amount of gratification and to reach 
the masculine goal. 

[323] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



How do neurotic symptoms originate? Why 
does the patient wish to be a man and constantly 
seek to prove to himself his virility? Why does 
he need so many egotistical forms of gratifica- 
tion? 

Because, Adler answers, there stands at the 
threshold of the neurosis a threatening feeling of 
inferiority and life becomes unbearable unless the 
neurotic can look forward to a situation which as- 
sures him, normally or abnormally, safety and 
superiority. 

The neurotic individual, aside from his purely 
neurotic symptoms, will easily become conspicuous 
owing to his evident inability to adapt himself to 
his environment. The consciousness of his weak 
point obsesses him to such a degree that often with- 
out knowing it, he begins to build over it a pro- 
tective structure. 

His sensitiveness becomes more acute; he learns 
to discern relationships which escape others, he 
exaggerates his cautiousness, anticipates all sorts 
of unpleasant consequences when he starts out to do 
something or suffers some injury; he endeavours to 
hear and to see more than others can hear or see; 
he belittles himself; he becomes insatiable, econom- 
ical, constantly strives to extend the boundaries 
of his influence and power over space and time and 
[324] 



Life a Constant Danger 



soon loses the peace of mind and the freedom from 
prejudice which guarantee mental health. 

His distrust of himself and others, his envy and 
maliciousness become more and more pronounced. 
He either tries to gain the upper hand in cruel, 
aggressive ways or he endeavours to dominate his 
environment by his very humility and submissive- 
ness. 

Freud points out that the neurosis is a means of 
escape from reality. Adler stresses the fact that 
to the neurotic, life is nothing but a dangerous 
adventure. Not only must he escape that danger 
but he must construct a strong system of defence 
that will protect him against it. The man for whom 
every woman constitutes a temptation may develop 
in his mind an obsessive fear of syphilis, after 
which he thinks himself secure behind that protec- 
tive wall; the unhappily mated wife escapes inter- 
course which is odious to her by developing vague 
pains in her sexual organs; an overworked country 
preacher runs away and becomes for a period of 
time a fruit seller ; the bed-ridden neurotic who finds 
life too monotonous has peculiar attacks, rushes to 
a window, threatens to commit suicide and hence 
secures the constant company of a nurse. 

All these neurotic symptoms are ready-for-use 
attitudes. The patient is not shamming. He un- 

[325] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



consciously remembers earlier defects, earlier 
sieges of sickness and reproduces them when an 
emergency arises. He unconsciously produces the 
required symptom as the fingers of a pianist repro- 
duce without any conscious effort a certain combi- 
nation of notes which has been carefully memo- 
rized. 

Adler foresees the objections which such a theory 
is bound to bring forth. How can trigeminal 
neuralgia, insomnia, paralysis, sick headaches, etc., 
afford the neurotic any form of gratification? Be- 
cause neurotic symptoms are in the majority of 
cases sure means for obtaining mastery over another 
person. And to that craving for power and su- 
periority the neurotic is as ready to sacrifice his 
comfort as normal human beings are to undergo 
hardships in order to attain some of their ideals. 
The neurotic's absurd goal is an abnormal ideal, 
but to him an ideal just the same. 

To Adler, dreams only acquire a meaning when 
we consider them as a symbol of life. The dream 
is a sketchlike reflection of psychic attitudes and 
reveals to the investigator the manner in which the 
dreamer regards certain problems. 

The dream is not the fulfilment of some infantile 
wishes, but a neurotic way of securing for the ego 
an easy form of gratification, and of solving prob- 
[326] 



Incestuous Dreams 



lems which to the neurotic appear too complicated. 
Repeated dreams of the same type reveal the course 
followed by the fictitious guiding line. They indi- 
cate various attempts at solving one problem and 
hence betray a characteristic feeling of uncertainty. 

The analysis of dreams appears as essential to 
Adler as to Freud as a part of the analytic treat- 
ment. Adler, however, rejects entirely the literal 
Freudian interpretation and shares some of Jung's 
symbolistic views. 

The incest motive he thinks is as little real in 
dreams as it is in the waking life of the individual. 
When man dreams for instance of intercourse with 
his mother, he is just running back to her for pro- 
tection as he did when a child. The fact that near 
relations appear so often in our dreams in sexual 
situations is due to the very make up of our uncon- 
scious. 

There are in our unconscious several layers of 
memory pictures and the deeper we go, the fewer 
pictures we find, until arriving at the bottom we 
only find the parents, the first pictures the indi- 
vidual ever beheld. That those are more likely to 
recur than any others and to be used symbolically 
whenever our archaic, primitive unconscious needs 
human types to symbolize men or women, is easily 
understood. 

[327] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



While Freud stressed the love motive, Adler 
stresses the power iriotive and thus explains the 
neurotic's strange inability to love, his strange 
tendency to become self-centred. 

Intent on protecting himself against all the perils 
of life, the neurotic is constantly on his guard. 
To surrender to any tender feeling would mean to 
him to submit to some other ego. 

Love to him is only another danger to be warded 
off, a weak spot in his defence system through which 
the enemy, life, might enter to defeat him. The 
neurotic will either try to be an ascetic or a Don 
Juan. As a mysogynist he will proclaim his su- 
periority over every woman, as a Don Juan he will 
proclaim woman's frailty and his irresistible viril- 
ity. In either direction he will be found totally 
lacking in measure. 

Artistic creation, to Adler, is simply another 
form of compensation for the individual's organic 
shortcomings. Organs of slight inferiority may 
develop, he says, greater functional capacities than 
normal organs. 

All mental operations have a tendency to concen- 
trate on the weak organ in order to protect it from 
harm. Singers, speakers, actors, he says, have 
generally recovered from some organic defect 
which in their infancy and childhood prompted 
[328] 



Genius a Compensation 



them to exercise their defective throat, tongue or 
lips. Musicians may have been overexercising a 
defective ear. Painters became interested in 
colours and nuances owing to their originally weak 
eyes. Adler calls our attention to the fact that 
Demosthenes, who became Greece's greatest orator, 
struggled for many years with an impediment in 
his speech, that Mozart and Beethoven suffered 
from severe ear trouble, that Bruckner's ears were 
stigmatized by moles, and that there are more cases 
of defective vision among pupils of art schools than 
among any other classes of the population. 

He even holds that our sense of inferiority deter- 
mines the profession we embrace in real life and 
mentions that many excellent chefs he examined 
were suffering or had recovered from acute gas- 
tric trouble. Their inferiority caused them to 
pay special attention to food and its preparation, 
etc. 

The social bearing of Adler's doctrines is briefly 
indicated in the preface to the second edition of 
his Neurotic Constitution: "Our Individual Psy- 
chology has gone far beyond the dead line of de- 
scriptive psychology; to understand a man means 
to save him from the errors into which he is led 
by his sore, frantic but futile craving to be like 
unto God and to make him amenable to the unshak- 

[329] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



able logic of human community life, to instil into 
him the community sense." 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

The best resume of Adler's theories will be found in 
Poul Bjerre's "Theory and Practice of Psychoanalysis." 
The only works of Adler's which are accessible to English 
readers are his monograph on "Organ Inferiority and 
its Psychic Compensation" (Nervous and Mental Disease 
Pub. Co.) which contains many case histories upon which 
he was to build his later theories. His "Neurotic Con- 
stitution" (Moffat, Yard) is less a book than a series of 
studies of the neurotic life from several points of view. 



[330] 



CHAPTER IV: KEMPF. DYNAMIC 
MECHANISM 

Valuable as their theories are, one cannot help 
feeling that Freud's and Jung's mode of thinking is 
still closely related to that of the academic psycholo- 
gists. They give the impression that the mental 
and the physical are two separate entities. The 
term conversion used by Freud to designate the 
physical symptoms accompanying certain emotions 
seems to imply a duality in organic manifestations 
which, to modern scientists, appears totally un- 
founded. 

When Freud and Jung speak of libido, cravings, 
censor, etc., they are almost as vague and uncon- 
vincing as Bergson when he speaks of the vital 
urge. 

Adler felt the necessity of establishing a more 
intimate connection between physical and mental 
manifestations, but he did not make the mechanism 
of compensation clearer to his readers than Freud 
did the mechanism of conversion. 

It will be only when we know what part of 

[331] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



the organism "produces" an emotion and, re- 
ciprocally, what part of the organism is af- 
fected by a given emotion, that we shall vis- 
ualize clearly the relations between "mind" and 
"body." Then we shall understand the mean- 
ing of the vital urge and of the libido; then, the so- 
called "nervous" disturbances as well as conscious- 
ness and its content (thought) shall lose their mys- 
tery. 

Edward J. Kempf, of Saint Elizabeth Hospital, 
Washington, D. C, attacks the problem from a new 
and original point of view. 

Kempf states frankly his dislike of the term 
libido. Although that term attempts to represent 
graphically the energic constitution of man and his 
love of life, it lacks clearness, for the human mind 
cannot very well conceive of a process as such, un- 
less there is some thing that proceeds. 

The concept of electricity would be hazy indeed, 
were it not that we can visualize dynamos, wires, 
sparks, bulbs and mahy other visible, tangible, etc., 
means of production or manifestation of the force 
called electricity. 

In order to explain the great physiological 
changes which influence human thought and be- 
haviour and the biological nature of man, Kempf 
has developed a conception of the personality based 
[332] 



The Importance of the Brain 



on the reflex actions of the autonomic nervous sys- 
tem. 

To him the human organism is a biological ma- 
chine which assimilates, conserves, transforms and 
expends energy. All those operations are regu- 
lated by the autonomic apparatus which keeps in 
touch with the environment through the projicient 
sensori-motor nervous system. 

As the autonomic apparatus becomes con- 
ditioned (trained) to have acquisitive and avertive 
tendencies toward its environment, according to 
which cravings are active in a given situation, the 
organism's behaviour is the resultant of a com- 
promise between the opposed cravings. 

The importance of the brain is greatly minimized 
by this conception. Experiments have proved that 
the same form of behaviour is not always due to the 
activity of the same brain cells and the theories 
which localize in certain regions of the brain the 
controlling forces of all human conduct must be 
abandoned. 

According to Kempf, brain and personality, so 
long associated in popular parlance, must no longer 
be considered as interchangeable terms. In fact, 
every part of the body contributes something to the 
personality and to its consciousness of itself. 

Should some one lose a limb or a group of 

[333] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



muscles, he would lose at the same time an im- 
portant part of his personality. This would mani- 
fest itself in the manner in which he would adjust 
himself to the stresses of daily life, what he would 
try to do and feel compelled to avoid, etc. 

Analysis alone would reveal that fact; the natural 
readjustment of the remaining muscles would pre- 
vent any gross change from being observable. 

For instance, the loss of the eyes and arms would 
greatly reduce the ability to understand new ma- 
chinery, new situations and probably reduce to an 
enormous extent the power of recalling experiences 
in which the eyes and hands played a predominant 
part, such as writing, etc. 

Because most of our thoughts are dependent 
upon our muscle sense, it may be said that we ac- 
tually think with our muscles. If we allow our- 
selves to become aware of the visual image of an 
automobile, we are aware that it is moving, because 
the muscles of the eyeball shift the image by modi- 
fying their postural tensions. 

Sometimes the muscles of the neck may con- 
tribute more information by moving the head. 

If we are pushing the automobile ourselves, the 
mtiscles of the body come into play to furnish other 
images and if we are pushing it along a cold, wet, 
muddy road, the sensations of cold, wetness and 
[334] 



The Social Herd 



mud arise from the tactile receptors of our legs. 

But such a perfect correlation between our 
autonomic apparatus and the sensori-motor system 
is a gradual acquisition of the human being in the 
course of it development. 

At birth, we have a well-developed, well-bal- 
anced, autonomic apparatus and a poorly co- 
ordinated sensori-motor system. The autonomic 
apparatus, however, begins immediately to co- 
ordinate and control the sensori-motor system in 
order to master its environment. 

A most important factor begins to exert pressure 
upon the infant from the very minute of its birth 
and exerts it throughout life. It is the incessant 
pressure of the social herd, which modifies the 
autonomic apparatus and compels it to adopt less 
and less primitive, more and more civilized and in- 
direct methods of satisfying the various human 
cravings. 

The tone or tension produced by the autonomic 
apparatus in the muscles which move our body and 
limbs determines largely the content of our con- 
sciousness or thoughts. 

This leads us to a complete reversal of the view 
held by the academic philosophers and psycho- 
logical laboratory observers. 

According to them the emotions are one of the re- 

[335] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



suits of the mind's contemplation of phenomena 
taking place within or without the organism. 
"Bodily" reactions and "mental" reactions take 
place after the emotion has been experienced. 

James and Lange advanced the theory that our 
feeling of bodily changes, following the perception 
of a stimulus, is the emotion. Kempf goes further 
and states that if we experience an emotion, it is 
because some parts of the autonomic apparatus 
have assumed a certain tension which produces the 
emotion. As evidence, he cites the fact that we 
are at times awakened at night by fearful tensions 
whose cause is unknown and then awaken to find 
that there is some one in our room. Nursing 
mothers experience vigorous disturbances in their 
sleep long before they become aware that their child 
is in distress. We become conscious of images of 
urinating in our dreams and find upon awakening, 
that uncomfortable tensions of the bladder have 
been active for some time owing to the accumula- 
tion of urine. 

Kempf's theory of the dynamic mechanism is 
worded as follows: 

"Whenever any segment of the autonomic-affec- 
tive apparatus is forced into a state of hypertension 
through the necessities of metabolism or endo- 
genous or exogenous stimuli, the hypertense seg- 
[336] 



The Basis of Behaviour 



ment gives off a stream of emotion or affective crav- 
ing which compels the projicient apparatus to so 
adjust the exteroceptors in the environment as to 
acquire stimuli which have the capacity to produce 
comfortable postural readjustments in those au- 
tonomic segments/ 9 

In other words, whenever autonomic nerves, for 
instance, the nerves causing the contractions of the 
stomach known as hunger, are made extremely tense 
by the sight or smell of food, they produce a strong 
emotion or desire which compels the sensori-motor 
nerves to apply the mouth to food, after which the 
tension of the autonomic nerves is relieved. 

Kempf maintains that this biologic principle or 
law is the foundation of all human and animal be- 
haviour, to be seen throughout all its workings, 
whether brief and trivial or prolonged and elabor- 
ate. "The seeking and creating follows the co- 
rollary 'to obtain a maximum of autonomic grati- 
fication with a minimum expenditure of energy,' 
thus developing increasing skill and power, exten- 
sion of influence and assurance of comfort and an 
increasing margin of safety from liability to 
failure." 

Most of the nervous tensions originating in the 
autonomic apparatus have as their biological aim 
the acquisition of appropriate pleasant stimulations 

[337] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



and the avoidance of destructive unpleasant ones; 
for instance, they direct us toward food and away 
from some danger. They are relieved only when 
their objective stimulus is attained. 

In certain cases the object is unattainable, being 
socially tobooed or having passed beyond our 
reach, as for example when a loved person dies. 
In such cases, tensions will remain unrelieved and 
become seriously distressing as well as dangerous 
for our mental and physical health. Among other 
things, they disturb the blood supply to certain 
organs and hence weaken them in their struggle 
against the bacteria of infectious diseases. 

In case of tuberculosis, pneumonia, typhoid, ex- 
cessive fatigue, an exaggerated emotional tension 
may be fatal. In other words, the individual who 
represses certain cravings because they are ungrati- 
fiable or for fear of the influence their gratification 
may have on his social standing, tends to have 
organs which are more liable to disease. 

The struggle between conflicting cravings was 
considered by psychologists of the old school as 
taking place in our "mind." Kempf shows us that 
it takes place in our autonomic apparatus. The 
sacral division may be conditioned to need stimuli 
that are perverse or tabooed and cause irritability 
and depression until gratified, whereas their un- 
[338] 



The Fight for Nervous Control 



restrained indulgence may greatly jeopardize the 
love for social esteeiil and the feeling of social fit- 
ness. The secret sense of social inferiority, due 
to some one's awareness of tabooed pelvic cravings, 
makes life in human society a fearful ordeal, which 
in turn, disturbs the respiratory, circulatory and 
gastronomic functions. Hence the needs or crav- 
ings of the different autonomic segments converge 
upon the projicient apparatus and behaviour is the 
physical or mechanical resultant. This compels 
the different autonomic segments to wage fierce 
conflict for control of our conduct and our conduct 
reveals the conflict. 

That struggle grows fiercer as the civilization 
in which we live grows more complex. At birth, 
the autonomic apparatus works smoothly, because 
the infant is dependent upon the mother and hence 
irresponsible. But when the mother begins to train 
the infant to nurse, urinate and defecate under 
certain specific conditions, the autonomic apparatus 
for the first time clashes with society which insists 
on self-restraint, self-control and self -refinement. 

Heedless indulgence by an individual of any age 
causes uncomfortable tensions in his associates, 
(disgust, fear, anger), and therefore they are com- 
pelled to control social tendencies in every in- 
dividual from his earliest childhood, 

[339] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



Acquisitive cravings know no social law, how- 
ever, and often threaten to jeopardize the person- 
ality by impelling it to do something which is 
illegal or immoral. For, after all, man is simply 
an ape that has learnt to wear clothes, to use words 
and signs and that can foresee in a general sense 
the possible biological and social results of certain 
indulgences. 

Autonomic segments of the infant are then 
trained (conditioned) to react to certain stimuli, 
for instance, to certain vocal sounds and touches 
indicating the time for nursing, to signs and touches 
indicating disapproval of certain acts; the fear of 
losing certain agreeable stimuli gradually develops 
in him a certain degree of self-control. 

Many cravings of an ungratifiable or unjustifi- 
able nature, however, resist all attempts on the part 
of our environment to curb them. Compensatory 
strivings are then set in motion to prevent them, 
either from manifesting themselves or from being 
recognized in order that the organism may escape 
the concomitant fear. A state of fear induces 
malnutrition and impotence and hence would be 
destructive for the individual and the race. 

When a craving is allowed to make the organ- 
ism aware of its needs, but is not allowed to cause 
overt acts, it is said to be suppressed. When it is 
[340] 






The Sane and the Insane 



not allowed to cause the organism to become aware 
of its needs, it may be said to have been repressed. 

But neither suppression nor repression is synony- 
mous with annihilation. Whether we remain in 
ignorance of the fact that a boiler is full of steam 
or simply disregard that fact, the steam is there, 
seeking an outlet and likely to create an abnormal 
one, unless a normal outlet is provided. 

Repressed autonomic segments, like steam in a 
boiler, need but the slightest opportunity offered 
by the environment, or the slightest relaxation of 
the repressing forces to obtain control of the sen- 
sorimotor nervous system. We may suppress our 
disgust or anger to save appearances but we will 
at the same time, by remarks, by our very tone of 
voice or gestures, betray our real feelings; we will 
have dreams which picture the attempted or suc- 
cessful gratification of suppressed cravings. 

The essential difference between most sane and 
insane people is that insane people cannot control 
their repressed cravings while sane people can. 
That is to say, when people become fatigued, toxic, 
dazed and can no longer control their repressed 
cravings, those cravings cause a form of behaviour 
which is termed insane. 

As the human individual grows and develops, he 
gradually becomes able to control the activities of 

[341] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



the various cravings with the exception, however, 
of the sexual cravings. When sexual cravings are 
normal, they are naturally justified and, under cer- 
tain conditions, they are permitted socially to 
dominate our behaviour. 

When the personality, on the other hand, con- 
siders sexual cravings as shameful inferiorities, 
either because they are perverse or because the per- 
sonality has been educated in a prudish way, the 
individual becomes forced into a form of adjust- 
ment which is abnormal on account of the auto- 
nomic conflict it entails. 

Whenever a violent conflict rages in our 
autonomic apparatus between acquisitive and aver- 
tive cravings, a neurosis ensues, or rather, the 
neurosis is the conflict. No constitutional predis- 
position is needed to bring about its onset. Life's 
experiences and the influence of our environment 
and associates are sufficient as determining factors. 

Kempf does not accept Freud's theory as to the 
importance of sex (love) in the causation of 
neurotic disturbances. Any of the primary crav- 
ings, love, hate, hunger, shame, sorrow, fear or 
disgust may cause a neurosis under appropriate 
conditions. 

The neurotic is suffering from cravings which 
he cannot allow to dominate his personality. 
[342] 






Reclassifying the Neuroses 



Those cravings are so often located in postural ten- 
sions of certain organs that they are probably con- 
sistent things even if they are not always discover- 
able. 

A strong craving like the famishing influence of 
protracted hunger, which originates in the stomach, 
or the severe itching of an area of the skin, may 
finally determine all the adjustments of the entire 
personality and be felt over the entire body. 

The result may be a severe struggle to eliminate 
the craving from the personality. Or the person- 
ality may resign itself to the domination of the 
craving and to a regression in which the individual 
enjoys tensions and images, fancies, delusions, hal- 
lucinations which simulate the craved reality. 

On the basis of this conception of the personality, 
Kempf rejects entirely the usual classification of 
mental disturbances into neuroses, psycho-neuroses 
and psychoses. That classification is very unscien- 
tific and unbiological for it is based upon symptoms 
which may change under different conditions or un- 
der the care of different physicians. In many in- 
stitutions, for example, the diagnosis "manic-de- 
pressive" tacitly means recoverable, while "de- 
mentia praecox" means incurable, so that if a 
dementia praecox patient shows a tendency to re- 
covery he is reclassified as "manic-depressive." 

[343] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



Kempf's classification takes into account the na- 
ture of the patient's autonomic cravings and his at- 
titude toward them, lit is, therefore, essentially 
mechanistic and truly biological. 

Every nervous disturbance is designated as a 
neurosis. 

The neurosis is then, according to its duration, 
termed acute, chronic or periodic. The term acute 
is reserved for cases of less than a year's duration. 
Chronic is applied to cases having had more than a 
year's duration or which have had an insidious 
course for more than a year before the consultation. 
Periodic is applied to cases which have periodic or 
intermittent episodes or recurrences accompanying 
natural phenomena such as menstruation, preg- 
nancy, marriage, death of a child, etc. 

The neurosis is further qualified with regard 
to its mechanism, that is, the insight the patient 
has retained. The neurosis is benign when the pa- 
tient recognizes that his distress or disease is due 
to the suppression of unjustifiable or ungratifiable 
cravings which are a part of his personality. The 
neurosis is pernicious when the patient refuses to 
attribute his trouble to a personal cause or wish, in- 
sists that it is due to an impersonal cause or a mali- 
cious influence and tends to hate any one who would 
attribute it to a personal source. 
[344] 






Reclassifying the Neuroses 



According to the mechanism of the autonomic 
conflict involved, neuroses are differentiated into 
five types : 

The suppression neuroses are characterized by 
the fact that the patient is more or less conscious of 
the nature and effect upon himself of his ungrati- 
fiable cravings. For instance, a man may be af- 
fected by his love for a faithless, indifferent or dead 
woman ; a soldier may be caught between two fears, 
that of death and that of a court martial, etc., and 
know that it causes him insomnia, headache, cardiac 
anxiety, diarrhoea, etc. 

In repression neuroses, the individual tries to 
prevent the autonomic cravings from making them- 
selves known and influencing his personality. A 
repressed fear may make a man blind or lame and 
he may feel convinced that an actual fall, bruise 
or wrench is responsible for his condition, because 
he has succeeded in making himself forget the 
cravings that are relieved by being blind or 
lame. 

Compensation neuroses are characterized by a 
reflex effort to develop functions which will com- 
pensate for some organic or functional inferiority 
or keep an undesirable craving repressed, which 
is unconsciously causing fear. Very often the ef- 
fort is adapted or designed to destroy or defeat en- 

[345] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



vironment factors which arouse the intolerable 
craving or oppose the compensation. Egotism, in- 
tolerance and exaggerated claims are typical of 
compensation neuroses. 

Regression neuroses are just the opposite. The 
individual makes no effort to win or retain social 
esteem and regresses to a lower, childlike or in- 
fantile level, becoming apathetic, slovenly, irre- 
sponsible, often showing suicidal tendencies, and 
allowing the cravings to do as they please. 

The regression may be a relatively benign epi- 
sode of a few months' duration. It may in other 
cases be followed by a feeling of having died and 
passed through a rebirth, and also of having 
eliminated all the sinful cravings in order to begin 
life anew. This form of adjustment may work as 
long as the subject lives in a protected, non-com- 
petitive environment. Later, an eccentric over- 
compensation often takes place which eventually 
leads to another neurosis or a permanent deteriora- 
tion of the personality. 

In dissociation neuroses, the patient succeeds in 
keeping his undesirable cravings repressed until 
they finally become dissociated. The individual 
is then conscious of weird, distorted images, hallu- 
cinations of past sensations and experiences which 
seem to gratify the dissociated effect although they 
[346] 



The Analytic Treatment 



horrify the individual. The individual is also 
dominated by unacceptable, mysterious obsessions, 
fears, compulsions and inspirations. There may 
be also severe visceral distress, motor disturbances, 
amnesia, etc. 

The analytic treatment as mapped out by Kempf, 
consists in developing a transference, that is, giving 
the subject an apportunity to rely upon the al- 
truistic judgment of some authoritative practitioner 
and enabling him to allow his repressions to make 
themselves conscious. 

Kempf disagrees with Jung on the extent to which 
the transference should be used and he considers 
it essential in order to help the neurotic to become 
socially constructive. Only in that way can the 
analyst fulfil the mission in which the neurotic's 
parents failed. 

After the subject succeeds in giving full expres- 
sion to his repressed affects, those affects become 
assimilated with the personality and form an inti- 
mate part of it, instead of remaining uncontrol- 
lable, unconscious or mysterious factors. In that 
way the dissociated cravings which cause obses- 
sions, phobias, mannerisms, compulsions, delu- 
sions, hallucinations, regressions, eccentric com- 
pensations and prejudices, are once more merged 
with the organism from which they had been ab- 

[347] 



Psychoanalysis and Behaviour 



normally separated and the functional distortion 
disappears. 

The subject having acquired insight and being 
free from the fear of something within himself, 
becomes capable of making a sensible, practical 
adjustment. 

When that readjustment is effected an intelligent 
use of the reconstructive, suggestive method seems 
to be most effective in giving the neurotic new in- 
terests for which to live and work, without seeking 
abnormal compensations for prudish or fearful re- 
pressions or yielding to perverse cravings. 

The choice of a method, Kempf thinks, should be 
left to the patient but he should not be allowed to 
avoid the work of reconstruction. Furthermore, 
the analysis should be accompanied by vigorous 
indulgence in social play requiring exposure of 
functional or organic inferiorities to more or less 
critical evaluation by competitors. Thus the sub- 
ject will become immune to the fear of failure or 
inferiority and will avoid eccentric compensation 
and a seclusive mode of life. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

To understand Kempf 's works one must have acquired 
a good working knowledge of the autonomic system and 
of endocrinology. See the bibliography following the 

[348] 



Bibliography 



chapter on Nerves and Nervousness. Kempf's style is 
extremely technical and remarkable for its accuracy but 
not easily understood by the layman. The body of his 
doctrines is contained in his book "Psychopathology," 
published by C. V. Mosby, in which he discusses the 
physical basis of the personality, the psychology of 
the family, the universal struggle for virility, organic 
and functional inferiorities and their influence on the 
personality, the various forms of neuroses, etc. 

Also consult the following monographs and articles: 
Kempf, Edward J. — "The Mechanistic Classification of 
Neuroses and Psychoses Produced by Distortion of 
the Autonomic-affective Functions," Journal of Nerv- 
ous and Mental Disease, August, 1919. 
Kempf, Edward J. — "The Tonus of Autonomic Segments 
as Causes of Abnormal Behaviour "Journal of Nerv- 
ous and Mental Disease, January, 1920. 
Kempf, Edward J. — "The Autonomic Functions and the 
Personality," Nervous and Mental Disease Mono- 
graph Series No. 28. 



JU^ouuJ 



[349] 



INDEX 



Absent-minded, 192 

Actors, 328 

Adler, 53, 54, 92, 106, 319 sqq. 

Adrenals, 89 

Adrenin, 26, 38 

Advice (to patients) , 283 

Alma Z. (case), 133 sqq. 

Anna (little Anna) , 73 sqq. 

Anxiety (dreams), 189 

Anxiety (neurosis), 297 

Aphasia, 107 

Aphonia, 107 

Appelt (A), 114 

Arpad (case), 69 sqq. 

Arterial (tension), 89 

Artistic (creation), 328, 329 

Ascetics, 241 

Aschner Test, 40, 41, 203 

Attitudes, 233 

Attitudes (ready for use), 325 

Autoerotism, 294 

Autonomic (system), 35 

Baby talk, 227 

Baldness, 279 

Beauchamp (case), 132 sqq. 

Bees (mating), 29 

Beethoven, 264, 329 

Bergson, 305 

Bernheim, 271 

Bleuler, 75 

Bourne (Rev. Ansel), 130 sqq. 

Bovary (Madame), 245 sqq. 

Brain, 333 

Bruckner, 329 



Calvities, 279 

Canalization (of the libido), 

315 
Cannon (W. B.), 33 
Castration, 241 
Caterpillars, 28 
Charcot, 271 
Charity, 248 

Chicago (vice report), 255 
Circus freaks, 56 
Clergymen, 258 

Compensation (neuroses), 345 
Complex, 17, 18 
Comstock (Anthony) , 259 sqq. 
Conflicts, 315 
Conversion, 331 
Copepods, 27 
Coriat (I. H.), 114 
Courtship, 226 
Cowards, 42, 43 
Cranio-sacral division, 36, 37 
Cranks, 92 

Craving (for power), 326 
Cravings, 240 
Cravings (parasitic), 247 
Crile (G. W.), 33 
Criminals (way of dealing 

with), 32 
Crowd psychology, 26 

Dementia praecox, 95 
Demosthenes, 329 
Dog (electric), 29, 30 
Dogs (experiments on), 25, 41, 
42, 45, 193 



[351] 



Index 



Don Juan, 328 

Dostoyevsky, 273 

Dreams, 185, 201 sqq., 219, 

290, 291, 311, 326 
Dual (personalities), 129-145 
Dubois, 281 
Diplomats, 170 
Disparagement, 94 
Dissociation (neuroses), 346 

Eder (M. D.), 114 

Edison, 190 

Energic (viewpoint), 305 

Enlightenment (sexual), 66-86 

Epidemics, 180 

Epileptics, 102 

Eroticism, 310 

Erotropism, 219 

Exhibitionism, 170, 171, 180, 

294 
Extroversion, 104 



Father (fixation), 61, 62, 63, 

221 sqq. 
Fatigue, 194 
Father (image), 221 
Ferenczi, 69, 101, 176 
Fetichism, 230 sqq. 
Fielding (W. J.), 251 
Fishes (observations on), 120, 

228 
Fixations (childhood), 53-65, 

295, 296 
Food-Ego-Power Urge, 39 
Frazer (J. G.), 115 
Free-will, 27 
Freud, 53, 54, 56, 66, 167, 181, 

200, 239, 271, 289 sqq. 
Freudians, 270, 274 
Frigidity, 253 
Frogs (experiments on), 24 



[352] 



Gastric fistula, 46 

Glycogen, 38 

Goal (fictitious), 322, 323 

Goethe, 242 

Golden Bough, 115 

Goodhart (Dr. S. P.), 136, 138 

Hanna (Rev. T. C.) 136 sqq. 
Hans (Little Hans), 69 
Heliotropism, 219 
Holding hands, 227 
Homosexualism, 234 
Hyperaesthetic, 254 
Hypnotic (technique), 272 
Hypnotism, 269 sqq. 

Imago, 309 

Imitation, 55, 57 

Impotence (dreams), 210 

Inbreeding, 123, 124 

Incest (fancy), 323 

Incest (in dreams), 214, 327 

Individual psychology, 319 

Individualism (neurotic), 313 

Inferiority (feeling of), 324 

Inferiority (organic), 320 

Insane (care of the), 160, 161, 

162, 163 
Insane (who were cured), 160, 

161 
Insanity, 299 
Intolerance, 177 
Introversion, 95, 226, 227 
Introverts, 308 

James (William), 131 
Jealousy, 225 
Jelliffe (Dr. S. K), 285 
Juke family, 124 
Jung, 73 sqq., 271, 280, 305 
sqq. 



Index 



Kempf (E. J.), 126, 127, 146 Normal (type), 39 
sqq., 240, 331 sqq. Noses (red) , 280 



Lay, William, 22 

Libido, 294, 299, 305, 331 

Liebeault, 271 

Loeb, Jacques, 22, 237 

Lombroso, 277 

Love, 219-233 

Love (at first sight), 223 

Love (unhappy), 229 

Manaceine (Mme. de), 200 

Marriage, 223 sqq. 

Masochism, 236 

Memory, 107 sqq. 

Mendel, 117 

Midianites, 173 

Mirbeau, 231 

Mitchell (Dr. S. Weir), 135 

Mnemotechnic methods, 110 

Monotony, 191 

Morality, 316 

Morphine, 284 

Moses, 173 

Mother (fixation) 58 sqq., 151, 

160, 213, 221 sqq. 
Mother (image), 221 
Mozart, 329 
Musicians, 329 
Mysogynist, 328 

Nagging, 100 

Napoleon, 190 

Narcotics, 200 

Neurasthenia, 298 

Neurosis, 297, 298, 343; classi- 
fication of neuroses, 344 

Nietzsche, 220 

Nightmares, 197, 198, 208, 209, 
210, 211 



Oedipus Complex, 54 
Onanism, 67 
Orange (blossoms), 188 
Orphans, 64 
Oversexed, 254 

Painters, 329 

Parents (image), 221 sqq. 

Parents (role of), 308 

Pathogenic (wishes), 292 

Pavlof, 45 

Perversions, 234 

Pfister, 251 

Philanthropy, 248 

Pigeons, 222, 235 

Polymorphous Perverse, 306 

Pouchet, 120 

Prayer (in sleeplessness), 199 

Prepubertal (period), 307 

Presexual (period), 306 

Prince (Morton), 132 

Psychoanalytic (point of view), 

289 
Psycho-neuroses, 298 
Psychoses, 298, 299 
Puritanism, 252-268 

Quacks, 251 
Quarrels, 46 

Raids, 179, 180 
Regression, 88, 273 
Regression (neuroses) , 346 
Religious meditation, 248 
Repression (neuroses), 345 
Retaliation, 175 
Reynolds (Mary), 135, 136 
Ring Doves, 222 



[353] 



Index 



Ripper (Jack the), 175 
Rodin, 242 

Sadism, 236 
Safety Urge, 39 
Scapegoats, 115-128 
Second (wind), 193 
Seditious persons, 174 
Selenium, 29 
Self-sacrifice, 310 
Sensori-motor nerves, 34-35 
Sex Books, 153 
Sex Urge, 39 
Shoes and Rice, 187, 188 
Sick (headache), 102 
Sidis (Boris), 269 
Singers, 328 
Sleep, 185-200 
Sleeplessness, 185-200 
Snakes (in dreams), 189 
Social Diseases, 256 
Social (herd), 335 
Speakers, 328 
Stammering, 107 sqq. 
Stork (stories), 74, 75 
Straton (Rev. J. R.), 257 
Sublimation, 239 sqq. 
Suggestion, 269 
Sumner (J. S.), 257, 263 
Sunday (Billy), 262 
Superstitions, 251 
Suppression (neuroses), 345 
Svengali, 273 



Sweat (glands), 185 
Symbols, 312 
Sympathetic system, 35 
Sympathicotonic, 40, 45, 47 

Talking (cures) 281 
Thoracico-lumbar division, 36, 

37 
Thumb-sucking, 293 
Tolstoy, 264 
Train (G. F.), 255 
Trance, 276 
Transference, 300-301 
Traumas, 292 
Typhoid vaccine, 43 

Unconscious, 13 sqq. 
Uniforms (military), 171, 172 
Urination (nervous) , 249 

Vagotonic, 40, 45, 47, 185 

Vegetative system, 35 

Vice (N. Y. Society for the 

Suppression of), 255 sqq. 
Vinci (Leonardo da), 242 



Western University 

ments), 196 
Wetterstrand, 278 
Will-to-Power, 100 
Worry, 196 

Zinzendorf, 248 



(experi- 



[354] 



%11~2X 



Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process. 
Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 
Treatment Date: Oct. 2004 

PreservationTechnologies 

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1 1 1 Thomson Park Drive 
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